


Atlas Hands

by marauders_groupie



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Historical, Alternate Universe - Royalty, Angst, Country & Western, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Historical sailing to be precise, Hurt/Comfort, In which Clarke throws herself into work to feel a little less empty, Pirates, Sailing, Slightly cowboyish shenanigans in CH4 and CH5, and Bellamy is an angsty sea captain, you know the drill we been here before
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-11
Updated: 2020-08-05
Packaged: 2020-08-19 06:11:08
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 22,959
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20205034
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/marauders_groupie/pseuds/marauders_groupie
Summary: “I’m looking for work, Captain Blake.”The man laughs, steps closer to her. She can see every freckle on his face now, the salt caught on his brow, the smell of rum permeating his skin.The desperation, in how he holds himself.Grief is coming off of him in waves lapping at their feet.“Your hands are too soft. Hair too clean.Princess.”*Historic sailing AU: The Princess of Arkadia runs away, and finds a home on the Queen Octavia with Captain Bellamy Blake and his crew.





	1. I. Atlas Hands

**Author's Note:**

> Hello everyone and welcome to the latest episode of Bellarke angst and emotional recovery with Lana! 
> 
> Joking aside, I know I've been gone for a long time. I missed this, missed you guys. 
> 
> This fic has two origin stories: I wanted to write it two years ago, and then I recently saw a prompt in which a princess runs away from an arranged marriage. It was meant to be. 
> 
> I hope you enjoy it! <3

_later that night_  
_i held an atlas in my lap_  
_ ran my fingers across the whole world_  
_ and whispered_  
_ where does it hurt?_

_it answered _

_everywhere_

_everywhere_

_everywhere._

\- **Warsan Shire** –

* * *

She grows desolate in a port city washed out by brine, bleached to pale blue by the winds.  


An enchanted princess, stuck in her castle on the hill. Watching the raging sea break waves on the reef, licking its way up the cliffs.  


As a child, Clarke Griffin dreamt of wonderful things, terrible things. Adventure and bravery and wilderness.  
  


But as you grow older, you learn to grow smaller.  


So Clarke nods, Clarke accepts, Clarke takes the role imposed on her until she is empty, gaping, blown wide open.  


When her mother insists that she marry a stranger, that emptiness in her rattles. That emptiness in her decides to just _not_, like a fish deciding to just stop swimming.   


Like the people who fall to the pavement and stay there for hours, refusing to speak and refusing to look.  


Clarke is empty and tired and for the first time in a long time, she says:  


"No."  


When the dawn has barely broken, she leaves, traipsing the city streets, praying for a miracle to take her far away from Arkadia.  


The miracle appears in the form of a ship, docked in the port of Sancta.   


She waits around the dock, grows familiar with the siren etched on the ship's bow. Out on the open sea, the rules of reality no longer exist. Sirens and monsters are just as real as deckhands with bloody calluses.  


And what better than a monster to drive away monsters?  


"She's beautiful, isn't she?"  


It's dusk already and her teeth are chattering from the cold. The man steps forward into the light and touches the figure on the bow.  


"Her name is Queen Octavia."  


Sturdy, big ship that has seen enough wars and days out in the open. Clarke touches it and for the first time in a long time, she can actually feel something.  


"What's your name?" he asks then, cocking his head to the side, surveying her in the light. "I've seen you down here a lot. What do you want?"  


"I'm looking for work."  


The man laughs, steps closer to her. She can see every freckle on his face now, the cunningness in his eyes. The smell of rum permeating his skin, the salt caught on his brow.   


The desperation, in how he holds himself. Grief is coming off of him in waves lapping at their feet.  


"I can do manual labor. I know how to sail, I'm a quick study. Really, Captain Blake -"  


"Your hands are too soft," he says suddenly, and grabs her hand.  


Clarke freezes, sensing the warmth of his skin on hers. His touch is not gentle. Not rough. Only apathetic.  


He looks at her and doesn't even _see_.  


If she is being honest, there isn't much to see anyway. Her bones are hollow. Stripped of her duty, she has become no one.  


Then, he takes a stray curl that escaped the braid tightly woven on the back of her head, and twirls it between his fingers.   


"Hair too clean. Princess."  


If her blood could boil, it would. But these days, the only thing she is capable of is taking the punches and remaining on her feet.  


"I know what I look like to you. I also know that you are officially transporting books and rum. Books burn easily on a ship like yours, and all the rum will be gone two months in. What happens when your rum and your luck run out, and you're in the middle of the ocean? What happens when you hit your head and you start bleeding? I practiced medicine. I can help. Can the rest of your crew?"  


This time, he does see her for who she is. Knit sweater, her father's coat, and a single bag containing everything she owns in this world.  


There is not much to carry when you are not much yourself.  


"Don't you care where we are sailing to?" he asks, the corners of his lips pulling up into a tired smile.  


Clarke shakes her head.   


"Xandria. It's six months at best, two years at worst. We won't see the mainland for weeks at a time. The work will be tiresome, the pay not nearly enough."  


She grits her teeth. The wind picks up, first signs of winter. The air smells like it's about to snow.  


"Alright."  


Captain Blake looks up towards the sky. You can't see the stars in these parts very well.   


When he looks at her again, he's as tired as she feels.  


"What are you running from?"  


There isn't much to say so she doesn't. Clarke lets the moment pass, feeling colder by the minute. She knows who Captain Blake is. His reputation precedes him.  


Everyone knows Bellamy Blake was the man who single handedly defended Sancta with a rickety schooner when he was only twenty years old.  


When she was younger, Clarke thought it was so brave of him to do it. She peeked behind the curtains when her mother showered him in gold and rare shells.  


He doesn't look like a hero now.  


"When do we leave?"

***

Blake tells her to get her affairs in order as they wait out the monsoon season. It'll be two months before they can set sail.  
  


She has no affairs to take care of so she rents a room in one of the boarding houses of Sancta.   


The landlady doesn't ask many questions, and Clarke finds a pair of scissors first.  


She is methodical as she cuts her hair. Strand by strand, inch by inch, she works her way to her chin, until she can no longer recognize a princess in the mirror. Just a tired woman. Just a commoner, much like her father.  


She takes to Sancta as though she were born there. It's a good place for empty people.   


Dirtier, darker, visceral. Makes her feel dirty, human, with all the sins and all the songs attached to the word.  


Women walk around with their skirts hoisted up to their thighs, and you can almost imagine trailing your fingers up and up, until you've struck honey.   


Dark alleys keep secrets of midnight trysts. Deckhands and governors paw at each other desperately. Sancta doesn't care if you were born into nobility. Everyone's blood is red. Everyone has creature needs.  


In Sancta, there's more opium than wine. There is more loss than love.  


Every Monday night, she sits in her room and listens to the radio announcing the comings and goings of ships.  


Catalina Grace docked in Reva. Her Royal Majesty's Flame set off from the port of Arkadia towards Polis.  


When the program is over, all she can hear is "If you have seen the Princess of Arkadia- " in Marcus Kane's tinny voice.  


She turns off the radio and goes to sleep. No one would ever mistake her for a princess here. Not in this pale blue room with only rats to keep her company. Not with her wild, unruly hair. Not with her dull eyes.  


She is safe.  


She is safe and she is leaving.

***

In December, when it's cold enough for the water in the port to freeze over, just a thin layer of ice on the surface, Clarke walks the pier towards the Queen Octavia.  
  


The first few weeks on board, she cries herself to sleep every night.  


All the clothes she has are bloody and her hands harden after the wounds have opened on the ropes one too many times.   


Blake watches her pull on them every day for hours, and looks at the brown spots remaining on the jute in her wake.  


He looks at her and she doesn't let him see anything but determination.  


_Look at me,_ she wants to say. _It hurts. I don't care. You don't know anything.  
_

By the end of the first month, the worst is over. Her lungs still hurt when she's on the deck; the air colder than ever before. When she breathes, it feels like her blood is freezing over.  


"Let's go! Come on!" Blake claps his hands and then rushes from the bridge to help his crew.   


His voice is gruff, raspy from too many cigars and long nights out in the open. She thinks he conducts himself with all the grace of an exile.   


Taking the punishment gladly.  


He pulls on the ropes the same as they do; when strange winds start blowing in the dead of night, he's right beside them, correcting the course of the ship, steering her away from the endless black void surrounding them.  


As long as they pull on the ropes, Clarke realizes, they don't feel lost.  


So she pulls harder.  


He comes to find her in her quarters one night.  


She sleeps in the hull. It's cold. Wet. She doesn't think she'll ever be warm again.   


For some reason, it feels good.  


Polite, Blake knocks on her door. He's leaning on the wood, cheeks whipped red. She can hear the cries of other deckhands above, the creaking of wood as they struggle to adjust the sails.  


"Hey. You good?"  


Her eyes are burning. She is not good, hasn't been good for a while. Something in her is very, very empty, and she suddenly feels tired without knowing how anyone could be _this_ tired.  


"Yes."  


He steps inside and suddenly, her cabin is smaller for it. He seems to take up space, expand in his navy sweater, rain boots, the beard he has given up on shaving.  


She won't be able to exorcise the stench of rum out of her room for days.  


"How are your hands?"  


This time, his voice is soft and she shakes her head. Wants to beg him to stop. If he's exiled, so is she.  


"I don't want your pity, Blake. My hands are fine," she shoots back, crossing her arms and tucking her hands into her elbow creases so he can't see the rough skin that took place of soft, the calluses that appear no matter how often she lets them harden, the black and blue wrists.  


"Hey," he interjects, raises his hands. "I'm not pitying you. Just making sure you can keep working, Princess."  


"Don't call me that."  


"I don't think Griffin is your real name either," he counters, smiling ruefully. He doesn't look at home on this ship. It's wild, crafted out of rich oak and teak, red colonnades. Not like him.  


Not like him at all.  


"How about I trade you? I'll tell you my first name if you tell me yours."  


At that, she laughs. "As if I haven't read enough stories about you."  


That takes him by surprise and he moves impossibly closer. There is still enough room in the cabin but Clarke struggles to breathe still.   


She looks out through the porthole. The sea looks just like the sky. Empty of any semblance of light.  


"You read stories about me?"  


The way he says it... Like he doesn't know. Like she's foreign, and not someone raised in these parts. Not someone who drank in stories of adventurers with her mother's milk, only to receive a slap on the fingers for feeling unafraid.  


"There isn't a man, woman or child in Arkadia who _hasn't_ read stories about you, Bellamy Blake."  


The name feels good on her tongue. Makes her lungs vibrate with it, reaching farther out towards him. Bellamy Blake. If the man bearing it weren't a shell of the hero, it would bear significance.  


Still, his eyes glisten when she says his name. The muscles in his jaw lock and he looks at her in a way she cannot comprehend.  


Clarke draws further inside herself. Relearns caution. Madness will kill her sooner than a crew member.  


"Say it again."  


It's dark, his voice infused with a twisted kind of desperation that pulls at her core. Makes her want to reach her fingers inside him and pull out something sticky and redeemable.  


"Bellamy Blake."  


Her tongue curls over the vowels and she wants to do something, anything, wants to throw him overboard, wants to let him devour her, wants...  


She _wants_.  


And she has not wanted anything in a very, very long time.  


She expects him to do something but Blake just nods, muscles as rigid as she first spoke. She can see the veins on his hands, the sinews in his neck pulled taut. Wonders if his throat is closing with want, too.  


She never gets her answer. He only places a jar overflowing with purple liquid on her nightstand and says, "For your hands."  


He leaves just as quickly as he came and then she's just left with lavender and skin and brine.

***

Later, when ice no longer forms on the stairs of the ship and Clarke can step outside to drink her coffee before anyone else, she realizes that she had to be cold and hungry and weary to really come back home to herself.   
  


To feel strong.   


To feel like _Clarke_ again.  


She looks at herself in the mirror and for the first time in the longest time, she recognizes the person she sees. 

***

Emori falls ill on what they believe to be the first day of spring.  
  


Days melt into weeks, and weeks melt into months. They forget where and when they are, but notice when Blake stops climbing the bow to etch ice off the siren sculpture.  


Clarke first fails to realize what is happening.   


Murphy, who works in the galley, is slinking around in the shadows near her cabin.  


"Are you the nurse?"  


Clarke looks at the sores on her arms and laughs. Her coat is threadbare and the winter was long.  
  


"Hardly. But I can help. Tell me what you need."  


She does not expect his girlfriend to cry out in pain when Clarke presses a hand to her skin. There is so much blood that she's coughing out, that is seeping from her nose.  


"I need wet rags and I need Blake."  


She stays by Emori's side for days on end. The waves rage around them, tipping the Octavia to one side and then the other, sending glass and metal flying across the room.  


Clarke changes her compresses and pours cinnamon and honey down the woman's lips.  


Blake comes every hour, stands in the doorway with a determined, focused look on his face that makes her realize she can trust him.  


Clarke can _trust_ this captain, this ship, and this crew.   


"What do you need, Griffin?"  


When she falls ill, just as Emori's fever subsides, it's Blake who scoops her up into his arms and brings her out onto the deck when she can't breathe.  


She is so tired and weak that she can barely stand. Has to let him press a hand to her back, his other arm holding her up.  


The air is cold but she swallows it.   


"You need to rest, Griffin," he tells her and she wants to protest but with her first cough out comes the blood. Her lungs are on fire.  


He wipes her blood from the floorboards. He wets her lips when they crack and ooze blood.  


And when she shakes and sweats, trying to exorcise more than this fever out of her body, he lifts her into his arms again and brings her to his quarters.  


"No - no - you'll get sick," she protests but thinks it comes out differently. Words have a strange, metallic taste in her mouth.   


"You can't be in that cold room in the hull anymore. I'll sleep somewhere else," he says, leaving no room for discussion as he makes Jasper bring more pillows. As he helps her lie down, he takes off her boots, takes off her clothes with infinite gentleness and respect.  


Not a lot of men undressed her but when they did, she could see the hunger in their eyes.  


All he's got is a concerned look, especially when he sees her arms. He touches the frostbite gingerly and winces when Clarke winces.  


"Why didn't you tell me? Fuck, Griffin. We're getting you a new coat."  


Blake changes her bedding every night and every day, he brings fresh fish Monty managed to pull out of the ocean.  


When the fever runs its highest, everyone hears her screaming. She's losing blood and her stomach feels like an open wound. It's too much, it's too much, and she knows she is going to die here, on this ship, with this crew, and with this captain.  


"Hey," he stops her from talking, brushes sweaty hair off her forehead. He is searing hot and she is so cold, so cold her bones ache, every inch of her skin feels covered in frostbite. "You'll be fine. Emori is better. You'll get better, too."  


The fever lasts ten days.   


Ten days in which she calls for him whenever her stomach turns and she knows she'll find blood. Ten days in which Blake feeds her and changes her and gives her enough water for sustenance. Ten days in which he holds her hand when she thinks more blood means stepping a little closer to death each time.  


"You're fine, you're fine," he whispers into her ear, his cheek so close to hers she can feel the heat radiating from his skin and seeping into her bones. She holds his hand because there isn't anything else to hold on to. "Just let it out. I'm here."  


She watches his concerned face above her own and she thinks she had it all wrong. He was never a hero. He was always a kind man.  


"Clarke," she says one night, when he's fallen asleep in the chair next to her bed. His quarters are warm, at least. She no longer feels as cold.   


Bellamy lifts his head and looks at her, uncomprehending.  


"My name," she croaks out, her throat feeling like barbed wire, "is Clarke Griffin."  


She feels better, less like catching on fire and more like her mind is thick with fog that won't let her focus on anything but sleep.  


The dark circles under his eyes seem to have sapped all of his strength. He hasn't shaved in days.   


But when she tells him her name, Bellamy Blake drops his head to his hands and laughs anyway.  


She catches herself smiling when he looks at her, exasperated.  


"Thank God you're feeling better."  


She still needs time before she's up and working, though. When she sneaks out and joins the crew on the deck, she makes them all promise not to tell him.  


He spots her soon enough and says, "Fuck no," drags her back to his quarters and makes her rest.  


"You're not dying on me, Griffin. Sit tight. We've got this."  


The rest of the crew comes to visit her when she realizes it must've been a virus everyone else is immune to. Only Clarke and Emori haven't travelled farther from Arkadia.  


Murphy brings her food from the galley. Even whips up a cake once. It tastes like stone, but Clarke is grateful anyway.  


"He hanged me once, you know," Murphy tells her right after Blake has come in to check on them. Clarke's stomach plummets but Murphy just shoots her a self-deprecating smile. "I _did_ try to sell everyone for twelve camels. But Blake gave me another chance. Made me work for it, but he gave me another chance."  


Clarke studies the scars on his neck, doesn't shy away from seeing the truth.  


"He's the only one who offered a second chance to me."  


She learns more about Bellamy in the days of her rest. Somehow, it seems like everyone has a story in which he helped them, even if both they and Bellamy fucked up first.  


"We were in the middle of the ocean and he threw my radio into the water," Raven Reyes, resident mechanic and weapons expert tells her. Her brace clinks against the chair whenever the ship rocks but still she talks with all the confidence of a gunslinger. There is a switchblade in her boot and Clarke thinks she must tuck it into her sleeping clothes, as well.  


"Thought I was a spy for the queen. I mean, I _was_. But he did try to kill Kane. Still, I've had a place on his ship ever since."  


The memories come to Clarke in waves. Her mother's second husband, the former governor of the Ark province, coming to tell her that a hero was behind his assassination attempt.  


The overheard conversations, debates and investigations Clarke was privy to only because no one paid much attention to a princess who knew how to make herself invisible.  


"It wasn't Blake. He was following orders," Clarke says suddenly. It comes rushing out of her without a pause. The idea of an incomplete story painting him as the villain troubles her, even if she is not sure why.   


Raven cocks her head, puzzled.  


"It was Schumway. The head of Kane's guard. He'd wanted his spot for a very long time."  


This time, she stops herself. Raven doesn't need to know that they used Bellamy's mother and sister to make him pull the trigger. That is personal.  


Still, the two women develop an unlikely friendship after that. Raven comes over to prattle with her gadgets and keep Clarke company.  


"This radar should alert us to any storms," she points at a mess of wires and an antenna duct taped to the center. "You ever been in a storm?"  


Clarke shakes her head. Out of everyone who comes to keep her company, Raven and Emori are her favorite. They always have stories to tell, ideas to test out.  


"Hey Clarke, what would happen if we grew our own plants on the ship?"  


"We'd all shit ourselves and die from the lack of protein."  


Emori laughs. "But what a way to go, huh?"  


With time, they stray into the personal territory. Somehow everyone knows her name now (even if Bellamy still hasn't spoken it out loud), and Clarke finds herself needing to twist the truth just a bit. The only thing she has to omit is her heritage.  


Raven knows more about her, she is pretty sure. The woman casts sidelong glances at her when she thinks Clarke is not looking and it's unnerving.   


"Out with it, Raven," she says one day, when she catches the woman looking. Raven swallows thickly and then raises her chin high, asks:  


"Are you the princess of Arkadia?"  


At first, Clarke wants to lie. To protect herself, to play along into her fantasy. But the ends of her hair are no longer crimson. Emori washes her hair with argan oil. Her hands are less rough than before.  


She's looking more like herself with each passing day. Just rougher around the edges, brittler, swear words rolling off her tongue like they fit.   


"I don't think I am. Not anymore."  


So she tells Raven everything and it feels good to. The woman sits quietly and listens, at times clenching her teeth and at others, smiling wistfully.  


By the time Clarke has told her everything, Raven nods.  


"I understand. Don't worry, I won't tell anyone. It's your story, Griffin."  


Clarke smiles at her, watery. "Thank you."  


Bellamy visits, too, but the better she feels, the less he comes over. He sends the crew, yes, but seems to fear being in the same room with her.  


It's a strange sensation, knowing that everyone is looking out for her and that she feels more like she belongs on this ship than she has in that castle cut from stone and driftwood.  


They chase behind the winter's tail, each sea colder than the previous. The ice is melting but she still hears Miller muttering how damn cold it is outside whenever he comes over to check up on her.  


Finally, Bellamy comes over one night and takes a seat next to her bed. The last time they were like this, she was shaking and sweating and gave him her name because she did not want to die unknown by him.   


He brought her a new coat the very next day.  


This time, he grips his chair and says, "Why didn't you tell me who you are?"  


Before Clarke has had the time to process his words, an endless stream of thoughts crowding her mind and slowly opening that emptiness in her chest up by inches, he produces a leaflet with her face on it.  


Her hair is longer and she is younger, but it's her. Her mother never stopped looking.  


"Imagine my surprise when we docked and I saw this on my way to picking up supplies."  


There's a drawing of her, and a title offering the person who can give the Crown of Arkadia information on her whereabouts their weight in gold.  


Clarke looks it over and then says, "You should take it." Bellamy blinks. "It'd be a lot of gold."  


Then she returns the leaflet and goes back to her book.  


"This conversation is not finished, Prin-"  


"You finish that sentence and we are through."  


He leans back in his seat, pressing his lips so tight they form a straight line.   


"I didn't tell you because it was irrelevant. I'm no longer the princess. The rules are clear enough. You leave, you abdicate. The moment I stepped foot out of that castle with the intention of never coming back... I wasn't Clarke of Arcadia anymore." She breathes in sharply. "If you want to hand me in, I'm sure my mother is going to reward you properly. Just like she did when you defended Sancta. But do not expect me to come peacefully."  


Hurt flashes across his face.  


"This is not- I'm not turning you in, Griffin. I just want to know why you didn't tell me."  


For a second, he looks deeply hurt. It does something to her, makes her insides twist.   


"Would you have let me on board if you'd known?" His silence is answer enough and after a beat, she says, "I didn't trust you."  


"And you trust me now?"  


She nods, curt.  


Bellamy looks relieved for a second, rakes his fingers through his hair and then leans forward, closer to her.  


This time, there is camaraderie between them when he looks at her as an equal and asks:  


"What are we going to do?"  


Outside, the birds are chirping. From the bed she is in - _his_, she reminds herself, _his_, even after the weeks she's been in it, she still wakes with the smell of salt and musk - she can clearly see the deck. Monty waves at her when she spots him, and she waves back.  


Only then does she feel like she can give him the answer he is desperate for, eyes begging and soul tired.  


"We aren't going to do anything. I'll go back to work tomorrow and you'll go back to ignoring me. I'll send a letter to my mother and ask her to stop looking. We'll go back to the sea, and when we come to Xandria, we'll go our separate ways."  


It sounds so simple when she says it, recites it off the top of her head. That was always the plan. And still, this time, it makes her stomach plummet. This ship, for all her faults, for all the winter and ice, has become her home.  


It's the first thing she will ever miss when she has to watch it set sail without her.  


Bellamy chuckles darkly and Clarke wants to ask him to let her in on the joke. But when he looks at her again, everything has changed.  


"You really think I could ever go back to ignoring you, Clarke?"  


The way he says her name - it means something. He says Clarke and she remembers the person she saw in the reflection of the mirror two days ago.   


Exhausted, but alive.   


Rough around the edges, but connected to who she feels she is.  


He says Clarke and everything falls into place.  


"So what do we do?"  
  


This time, he smiles proper. All teeth, as wide as the sea between Arkadia and Xandria. Enough glee in his eyes to feast on it.  


"Whatever the hell we want."  


She likes the sound of that and so she smiles back. It feels like a truce, an end to a war they didn't know they were fighting.  


"That sounds really good. Whatever the hell we want."

***

She goes back to work the next day but has to come to terms with Bellamy smearing the cream on her hands every day.  
  


"You're annoying. I don't even have calluses anymore," she says, rolling her eyes. He sighs, exasperated.  


"And that frostbite?"  


He gives her one of his coats, even if it's not cold outside anymore. Raven tells her they're near Tondeesee.  


"We're getting warmer."  


Clarke knows they still have continents to sail past, and at least another winter to endure.   


Spring comes into full swing with their mast breaking down. They spend days out in the open sea, every crew member rushing around to help Bellamy and Raven fix it.  


They're sitting ducks and it bears heavily on his shoulders so Clarke sneaks a book she likes and a bottle of rum she'd been given at the beginning of the journey. Leaves it on his desk when he's not in his quarters.  


And his quarters are a thing, too.   


Even after she's healed, he doesn't let her go back to her room. They fight so much that the windows rattle and Miller and Raven, the bravest of the crew, venture forth and ask if everything's alright.  


In the end, Clarke stays where she is, with her bag being brought to her.  


"You'll get tuberculosis in that room," Bellamy snaps when she protests. "You're staying here. End of discussion."  


She learns to love the quarters. The smell of rum is replaced with the smell of salt water as she insists on letting the air work its way through the room, washing it clean of a long winter and fogged windows.  


In the light of day, she can appreciate the books lining his shelves, the pictures he keeps hidden in a corner. The medal buried underneath a pile of maps, the medal that glinted when Clarke was thirteen and her mother had given it to him, the savior of Arkadia.  


"How did you know what your mother gave me?" he asks her one night when it's long past midnight and they are poring over maps together.   


They'll catch the end of a monsoon season if they go towards Xandria directly. If they choose a longer path, it'll be one more year before they reach their destination.  


Everyone is getting antsy, and Bellamy is the most nervous of them all.  


"Because I was there. Hiding, of course," she says and grins. He'd warmed up some coffee for them over the hearth and it tastes washed out but Clarke thinks it may be her favorite drink anyway. "You looked so.."  


"Dashing?" he teases. They're getting better at this, this strange friendship that could not be erased by her heritage or his prejudice.  


Clarke smirks. "Young. I heard all of it. You didn't want to take the gold. _My homeland, my responsibility_. It was... different."  


He sighs. Rolls up the map before him, the red cross marking Xandria imprinted on her eyelids.  


"You were, what, thirteen?" Clarke nods. "Why did you care about some guy who saved a port?"  


When she was thirteen, Clarke was older than she was now, but she doesn't tell him that. Doesn't tell him that _this_ is easy. Working herself to the bone, letting the rain pelt her coat, wind whip her cheeks, falling asleep sore.  


It's easy because she doesn't have the time to stop and think.  


Being thirteen and helpless in the face of an invasion was worse. When the only thing she could do was wait for strangers to kill her family and kill her people.  


Instead, she says, "I killed a hundred people when I was seventeen."  


She waits for him to choke on thin air, gasp, move away. But Bellamy doesn't do anything, just waits for her to go on.  


"There was an alliance to be made between us and the Trikru in the war. I was in their capital when I overheard them saying they would turn against us and join our enemy. My mother told me it couldn't be. Kane told her it couldn't be."  


The mere memory brings tears of fury to her eyes. Kane, doggedly hoping for a brighter future that involved no violence.   


Even in the middle of a war.  


"There were one hundred of them. Governors, politicians, councilmen. Trikru warriors. When they passed the decision to lead the attack on us at dawn, I locked their chamber. I closed the door and set them all on fire."  


Her mother cried for her soul. Clarke couldn't even cry.  


"The next morning, I was in Arkadia and people were still alive. They spotted enemy ships far off and managed to defend themselves, but barely. Children were playing in the street. No one lost their parents."  


"If the Trikru attacked, the losses would be insurmountable," he says with all the gravity of someone who knows war.   


Clarke nods.  


"My mother signed a peace treaty with the commanders the next day. I was there. They called me Wanheda."  


The commander of death.   


As long as it wasn't the death of her people, Clarke could live with that.  


"There were no wars after that." She traces the ridge of his desk, probes the mahogany with her fingers and a sheer layer of lacquer sticks to her hand. Red. "Arkadia has been living peacefully ever since. I did everything I could to make that possible."  


"I don't know if that makes me a monster. I slept soundly. I didn't dwell on it. But I had to leave when I could no longer recognize myself. My people were thriving and I was just... Hollow. _That_ is what drove me away. Not the deaths, not the violence. The emptiness."  


His hand is light on hers, but tangible enough to know that he is there.  


She looks at Bellamy and doesn't see fear in his eyes. She sees understanding.  


"I suppose that doesn't make me the good guy, huh?" she asks, flat. Bellamy is still looking at her and she feels like she just swallowed cotton, all dry and heaving and hollow.  


"There are no good guys, Clarke."  


And this is how they keep sailing, how they keep going with nowhere to go to. They tell the crew together, standing side by side.  


If anyone thinks it's strange, they don't show it.   


Murphy just shrugs, says, "What's one more year?"  


The rest seem to feel the same and they go back to their routine. Clarke works on the deck, Bellamy doesn't sleep in his room, but they still crawl to each other at the end of a long day.  


One night, they've stayed up too late talking again.   


Clarke can't help herself - he _understands_. She wants to tell him everything just so she could see herself reflected in him, in the knowledge that both of them have toed the line between good and bad one too many times. They exist permanently in that grey area.  


He's nearly fallen asleep, his cheek in his hand as he struggles to stay awake, listening to her slur words about things that no longer matter.  


"You should go to bed, Bellamy," she tells him, soft. She's tired, too, but it's a good kind of tired. It's the kind of tired she can get rest for.  


He shakes his head, mumbles something incoherent, "Not leaving now."  


Clarke smiles at him, lets herself cross what little distance there is between the desk and their bed. It smells like both of them, even if it's just her in it these days.  


"I didn't mean you had to leave."  


Maybe she enjoys the slow realization dawning in his face, painting his features softer, his movements more fluid.  


He smells like the sea and she buries a smile into the threadbare cotton of his shirt.  


Spring was good to them. They started feeling a little more at home in their own skin.  


"What is it, Princess?" he asks, nuzzles at the nape of her neck and brings an arm around her waist. The bare piece of skin shivers under his touch. She doesn't even mind the nickname.  


Clarke takes off her clothes first.  


He drinks her in, curious. She watches his eyes trail over the scars on her stomach, scabbed over frostbite on her arms. The muscle that slowly built up every time she pulled the ropes, every time she got winded trying to keep them on course.  


She hasn't thought of herself in terms of beautiful for a very long time.  


_Strong_ sounded better.  


"Come here, Princess."  


She lands in his hands holding on to her hips, thumbs rubbing invisible patterns into her skin. She feels decomposed in front of him, can feel every sinew, every bit of fat, every nerve ending.  


She feels she is flesh, but so much more still.  


"I could make you feel so good," he whispers into her stomach as she cards her fingers through his messy curls.   


His breath is warm on her skin, his fingers toying with the edge of her underwear and dipping lower only to show her that he's here and he's ready to serve. In any way she needs him to.  


But both of them are tired so she presses a kiss to the top of his head and drags him under the covers, wraps her arms around him and breathes.  


For a while, she just breathes.  


"Someday, Bellamy. Someday."

***

She thrives on the Octavia. The work is hard and yes, he was right, not nearly paid well enough. Still, there's rum and on their new course, they dock at least once a week.  
  


The first time, they've all gone a little stir crazy.   


Raven slept in the nets hanging by the ship. Murphy added hallucinogenic mushrooms to their lunch and they spent an afternoon wanting to hurl themselves off the deck.  


So when they dock in a seaside town, they get the fun they deserve.  


Clarke sticks with Raven and Emori, hunting spare parts for the mast, and they end up sitting in a cafe with wine - actual _wine_ \- for hours.  


Raven laughs, soaking in the sunlight reflecting off her heated skin. Emori sips her wine while throwing quips at the mechanic, grinning like the glinting edge of a blade.  


It's fun, Clarke realizes at once. They're just three women drinking copious amounts of wine and hollering at people passing by.  


"We really are fucking sailors," Raven presses out between shots of tequila and chases it with more wine. Emori snags a crate for the journey, the bottles inside clinking as they make their way to the Octavia. 

That night, they stay anchored down and throw a feast. The ship is alight with makeshift lights Raven strung between masts, and Murphy even broils a whole damn pig on a spit.  
  
Clarke finds herself in Bellamy's lap at one point, laughing at something Miller says, as Bellamy holds her down, dragging a hand up and down her thigh mindlessly.  


It feels good, their motley crew, their makeshift family taking care of one another.  


Finally, they bring out the wine and then everyone is dancing along to the music streaming from the record player Bellamy has kept hidden in his cabin, Raven and Emori, Miller and Bellamy, passing each other to the left and to the right and _everywhere_ in a mindless, whirling frenzy of joy so thick you could cut and eat it with a cake.  


There's nowhere to rush to so Clarke doesn't.   


She takes her sweet time, soaking in the lights and letting the air warm her body up. Jasper, an engine apprentice, even takes a swan dive into the water, screaming and begging them to pull him out, much to everyone else's amusement.  


It's good, it's so, so good that Clarke somehow looks at Bellamy in the worst possible moment, only to find him looking at her.  


She doesn't need to ask, and he doesn't have to say. They both know to excuse themselves and slink away into the first dark corridor, the first empty cabin, pawing at each other like two teenagers who just discovered that they could use their bodies to feel ecstasy.  


She kisses him hungrily, like she wants to eat him up, and he's quick with his fingers, getting her off even before she's had a second to orient herself.  
  


Outside, their crew laughs and taunts each other, the ship is swaying from side to side, and Clarke can't breathe with Bellamy's body pressed to hers, with his grunts in her mouth, his fingers unwinding her.  


"You should taste yourself, Clarke," he says, pupils blown wide, one hand still cupping her. "Do you want to?"  


She nods, doesn't know what came over her, has felt dirty since she stepped foot on this ship and now he's washing her clean.  


"Nuh uh," he shakes his head, smiling dangerously. "You gotta use your words."  


Clarke swallows thickly.  


"Show me how I taste, Bellamy. _Please_."  


He brings two fingers to her mouth and she opens wide, watches him watching her as she licks the taste of her mixed with the taste of him.  


Then he presses his mouth to hers, searing hot, and she's a writhing mess again, begging to be touched because _fuck_, it feels so good, it feels so good to feel human and full of need again.  


By the time they hear the first rustle of crew members going to sleep, they're spent, soaked foreheads pressed to one another.  


"Thank you," she breathes out. He's breathing against her lips, winding down while still rutting like a pair of animals, skin on skin too much for the feeling they're trying to chase tonight.  


She tries to make herself think about this rationally, but she can't. It feels good. _He_ feels good.  


He smiles and she can feel it on her skin. "You're welcome. Wanted to do that since I first saw you."  


This time, their kiss is lazier, slower. Languid. They stop on their way to his cabin so many times, just to get away with kissing each other, high on life and the maddening frenzy.  


He lays her to bed, takes off her boots and peels away her clothes. It feels like ages since she last wore something other than a pale blue shirt and ripped pants.  


She's been aboard the Octavia for five months now and the spartan life suits her. The less things she has, the less she has to think about. It gave her freedom.  


And now, looking at Bellamy smiling at her as he gets ready for bed, she thinks that maybe she needed that extra room in her heart.  


"How are you feeling?"  


She lays her head on his chest, takes a deep breath.   


"I'm good."  


"Really good," he runs his fingers through her hair, kisses the top of her head, "or just telling me what I want to hear?"  


She chuckles at that, flips over so she can see him. The lights are still shining outside and she can count every freckle, runs her thumb across the scar on his lip.  


"Really good. I promise."

***

They all get a little feral, unhinged when the summer comes. Bellamy sits on the bridge, feet on the helm and sunglasses perched atop his nose.  
  


Raven ventures out on the deck with a piece of aluminum foil to soak in the sun rays. Gets hot and then dives into the blue.  


"There are sharks in there, Reyes!" Miller shouts after her but she emerges victorious.  


"Let 'em come! I don't give a fuck!"  


They fall into various states of disarray and Clarke worries. Of course she does.  


When she tells Bellamy she thinks they shouldn't be anchoring down so often, he gets this frustrated look on his face that pisses her off in turn.  


"It was a long winter and we've still got a year to go, Clarke. They deserve to have some fun."  


"They're _chaotic_, Bellamy! Half of them haven't been sober since last Tuesday!"  


He laughs darkly at that.  


"They're sailors, Griffin. What were you expecting?"  


She swears at that, leaves in a huff, slamming the door in her wake. If he weren't that fucking hellbent on destroying himself, maybe he'd try and make this crew more disciplined, reliable.  


Instead, she's the only one checking the knots and counting their rations.  


Emori catches her in the storage room one day and makes her sit down.  


"What's wrong, Griffin? Out with it."  


"I don't know how we're gonna survive another year on this ship. Half of it is falling apart. Our reserves aren't nearly enough. Everyone's drunk as -"  


"Whoa, ease up!" Emori raises her hands in mock defeat, then leans back in her chair. Clarke admires her patience. "Listen, from what John told me, nothing bad has happened to anyone sailing on this ship. Octavia takes care of her own. Yes, she's seen better days. Yes, we're doing our best to arrive with no rum on board. But you have to trust the crew. You have to trust _him_."  


Clarke huffs angrily and Emori drops her head, gives her an all-knowing look.   


"But you don't, do you?"  


It hits her like lightning.   


She sleeps with him, she talks to him, but she doesn't trust him to keep her safe after a certain point.  


She doesn't trust _anyone_ who is not her to keep her safe.  
  


"Then - shit. You gotta talk to him. This doesn't work unless you trust your captain."  


She lets it stew for a few days.   


Bellamy sleeps in her old cabin and they only nod at each other in passing. It picks at her, the fact that he can be so cold to her now, but she lets it collect inside her until they're all discussing something in his cabin and it erupts out of her, bile and fury pouring out.  
  


"Maybe if you weren't so self-destructive you'd see that everything is falling apart! Jordan is depressed again, did you know? Murphy had to take his gun the other day! And this piece of shit," she kicks the floorboard for emphasis, "is falling apart too! How long until our engine explodes and we're stranded in the middle of the ocean with a captain who says: _Whatever the hell you want_?"  


At that point, she is already pressing her palms on his desk, coming into his space, wild and delirious both with fear and how nonchalantly he ignores her.  


"This is why you don't fuck a crew member," someone in the back of the room mutters but Clarke's too busy focusing on him and the dark clouds swirling in his eyes.  


For a second, he just takes it, and then...  
  


"We're docking in two days. Then you're off the boat." He turns away calmly. "Miller, what's the status on hull repairs?"  


Her blood hasn't boiled in a long time. She welcomes it, grabs for his lapels and falls short, prostrates on the desk, scattering papers back and forth.  


This time, she _does_ get a reaction out of him.  


"Everyone out. _Now_," he adds when no one moves. It's like a train wreck and they can't look away.  


She gets back on her feet but she's still whirling when he leans his head on the closed door.  


"What do you want from me, Clarke?"  


"For you to act like a leader for once in your life!"  


He laughs mirthlessly and turns around to face her. He looks like he did back in December, sullen and bitter.  


"In the last ten minutes, you've called me self-destructive, careless, and you insulted my ship. Give me one good reason not to make you walk the plank right now."  


Her stomach plummets. This is a side of him she hasn't seen before. Ruthless.  


"_Now_ you're quiet? Listen here, Griffin. This is my ship and when you're on it, you listen to my rules. Just because we slept together doesn't mean you're in charge now. And you may have been a royal back in Arkadia, but you're not anymore. You have five month of sailing experience, two months of which you've spent sick. I will not let you put my crew in danger anymore. We dock, and you're off. Until then, I don't want to see-"  


He doesn't get to finish the sentence.   


There is a booming sound outside and then the Octavia shakes, brings them both to their hands and knees.  


Raven is yelling, and the boat tilts to the left.  


Both of them think the same thing: the hull has been breached.  


"Go," she tells him, getting to her feet and reaching for the drawer he keeps his guns in. "I'm right after you."  


He takes off as soon as he scans her face, and she hears gunfire not a second later. There is more screaming and shouting, and then it all goes quiet.  


When she emerges out on the deck, most of the crew are on their knees, hands behind their heads.  


"And now the woman of the hour," someone says and Clarke turns. The woman has a gruff voice, steady feet. "Nice to finally meet you, Princess Clarke."  


"Who are you?"  


"No, Clarke, don't-" Bellamy tries and one of the men hits him with the butt of his gun.   


"Colonel Diyoza."  


Clarke takes one look at her and realizes that she is a bounty hunter.  


"You're here for the gold."  


"Or something better, if you're offering," she allows. When Clarke stays quiet, she grabs her hand and takes her gun in one swift motion. "Guess not. She'll be coming with us, if you don't mind."  


There's a small, fast ship moored to theirs. A mooring grapple made a hole in their hull. When she leaves, they all sink.  


"Under one condition."  


Diyoza lifts an eyebrow.  


"You repair their ship. I'll come with you without a struggle, but only if they survive."  


"If not?"  


"I'll kill myself," she states plainly. "Say goodbye to your prize. Queen Abigail won't pay for a dead daughter. She'll only hang you."  


For a second, she thinks Diyoza will call her bluff but she must find something in Clarke's face because the next thing out of her mouth is, "Zeke. Take your gear and help them fix it. We'll be back for you."  


They take her, and no one makes a move to stop them.

***

For days, she stays locked in the wet gunpowder room. She hears Diyoza barking out commands outside, gunfire at times, too.  
  


In the end, there's no way out. She has nothing to offer and she's sure the man Diyoza left behind would kill them all if Clarke harmed herself.  


In the evening, Diyoza comes over to bring her food and fish for intel.  


"So, how does a princess end up on a boat with Bellamy Blake?"  


The first few times she asks, Clarke averts her gaze and stays quiet. Then, one night, she adds: "You in love with him or somethin'?" and it's enough to make Clarke laugh.  


"Would _you _want to stay in Arkadia?" Clarke counters, looking the woman over. "I bet you left as soon as you could. The only thing that's making me curious is how you think my mother will forgive a pirate."  


Diyoza flinches and she knows she was right. Like her father before her, Charmaine Diyoza pillaged and wrecked more ships than any pirate in the history of Arkadia. But not before a brief stunt in the Royal Navy, where she rose in rank faster than any man or woman before her.  


"That's fair," the woman ultimately accepts with a grimace and offers Clarke some of her tequila. "I was just trying to make conversation."  


"Don't bother. I don't talk to pirates."  


"Oh?" she asks, smiling curiously. There's something dangerous about that smile. "So how come you've no problem staying aboard the Red Queen Octavia?"  


When Clarke doesn't say anything, it dawns on Diyoza.  


"You don't know. Oh my God, you have no idea at all!" She cackles, revels in it until Clarke feels her insides twisting. "No one killed more people in Xandria than Octavia Blake under her rule. And no one pillaged for her as fervently as her brother did."  


Clarke feels...  


Well, Clarke feels nothing at all. Empty, again. Lied to, again. The smiles of the crew, Bellamy's hands on her skin - lies.  


"What is it that you think they're transporting on that ship? Books? They used to hide jewels in books, back in the day. Intercept royal ships and kill everyone on board if they weren't willing to give up their secrets. Blake, if I remember correctly, enjoyed his little crusades the most. He killed three hundred in the Battle of Hakeldama. They say the sea was red for as far as you could see."  
  


"Stop."  


She wants to throw up, wants to turn her skin inside out, chokes on the thin air, smells like gunpowder and it's making her sick to her stomach.  


Diyoza gets up.  


"That's who you're sailing with, Princess. If I were you, I'd be grateful we found you when we did."

***

Her mother is waiting for her in another nameless port, and she falls on Clarke like a ten ton weight, hands roaming all over to make sure her daughter is really here.  
  


It would be touching if Clarke still wasn't so enraptured by the information Diyoza gave her. In the morning, it made her clutch the gunpowder barrels and throw up. In the evening, it made her question every interaction she's ever had with the crew.  


Bellamy included.  


Then, as the days pass, she wonders why it makes her sick when she's killed hundreds, too. When Lexa told her her back wasn't nearly big enough for the kill marks.  


And then she looks at her mother but sees straight through her.  


"Whatever it is, honey, we'll fix it. We'll come back home and we'll fix it."  


On their third day together, Diyoza comes for her reward and Abby weighs the decision, as regal as always, even in a shitty little tavern.  


It's sweltering hot inside, even though Clarke can hear hurricane rain pelting the tin roof. Echoing throughout the room.  


"My queen, I believe we are owed a prize for bringing your daughter in. Unharmed."  


"You're a pirate, Charmaine Diyoza," Abby says, collected, lips pursed in a think line. "You killed forty two of Arkadia's finest men and women. I should have you executed for -"  


"Pardon her."  


Her own voice surprises Clarke. She's been sitting on the sidelines these past few days. Let her mother speak for her. Let the emptiness envelop her bones again. It feels like torture, it feels like nothing at all.  


But she looks at Diyoza, now stunned as well, and her mother, worried and confused, and she offers them a different solution.  


"Pardon her and give her the gold she is owed. Please."  


The words roll over her lips with the weight of mountains and Clarke has to hold on to the table to stop herself from falling inwards. Her knuckles have gone completely white by the time Abby turns to Diyoza, both women stunned.  


"You are pardoned, Charmaine Diyoza, but you are still banished from Arkadia until the day you die."  


Diyoza turns on her heel to leave after thanking Abby but Clarke stops her. Presses out, "You owe me a debt, Diyoza."  


The words surprise her, how easily she sounds just like Murphy and Raven and Bellamy.   


A debt.   


She wants her pound of flesh.  


"I know."  


Clarke nods, and there is a moment of dark understanding between them before the door blows open.  


It's Raven she sees first.  


"We came here for Clarke Griffin and if you all sit down and shut up, you won't be harmed!"  


This time, Clarke does laugh.   


It comes out of her like lava, spilling over her lips and across the room, slapping her mother right in the face, and making Raven grin.  


"What is all this, Clarke?" Abby asks and Clarke stands up, waits for that final head to peer through the door, those last boots to come crushing the floorboards and stomping towards her.  


She waits for a long time. For years, it feels like. The entirety of her emotions wash over her and she feels gray, sunken, lost by the time she does see him.  


She's forgotten how beautiful he was. Now clean shaven, wearing nothing but a navy shirt and those heavy, heavy boots.  


He reaches for her immediately, and they knock pitchers off the tables, throw people to the floor, shock the room into silence.   


Bellamy has his hands on her and it doesn't feel like he's ever letting go.  


"You came."  


"I couldn't leave my girl," he smiles and then she feels it on her lips, feels how much he's missed her and she missed this, she missed having someone to chase after her.   


Not out of duty, but because she finally meant something. All on her own.  


"What took you so long?" she asks, her head buried in his neck. She knows she should hate him, knows he is a war criminal, knows all of these things but still feels like her heart is in the right place.  


He came for her.  


They all came for her, she can see now.   


Murphy and Emori, back to back and guns in hand. Miller securing the door. Jasper grabbing a bottle of liquor, Monty helping Raven and Diyoza's man with a piece of technology.  


"I'm glad you're okay." He runs a finger over her cheekbone, cups her face and smiles. "I'm sorry we didn't come sooner. You good?"  


Clarke nods, smiles back.  


"I'm good."  


She's kissing a pirate, a criminal, a wanted murderer in the middle of a tavern as her mother looks on and for the life of her, Clarke can't feel any remorse.  


"I'm sorry for what I said."  


"You were right." He smiles grimly. "We were chaotic before you came. I missed you on my ship, Griffin. So what do you say?"  


"When do we set sail?"  


"Clarke? What is going on?" her mother finally asks and she turns to her, Bellamy's arms still on her waist.  


No remorse. If anything, just laughter bubbling over her lips.  


"I'm sorry, mom. I can't stay."  


"You're leaving with these criminals?"  


Clarke nods, smiles at Bellamy, Raven, the rest of her makeshift family.  


"They're my people."  


Tears are welling in Abby's eyes and she grabs Clarke's hand, squeezes.  


"You'll always have a home in Arkadia."  


Clarke wonders how many people her mother will have to pardon before the day is over because she makes her way around the room and pardons everyone who has kept Clarke alive during those long months where she hoped the ship would swallow her whole.  


When she is done, they are escorted to their ship, Clarke and Bellamy walking hand in hand at the head of the crowd.  


When they're finally aboard, she watches Raven fight with Diyoza, the man who she left behind now holding on to the mechanic like he has no intention of letting her go.  


"If you disobey me, Zeke-"  


"I'm staying, Diyoza. You can steer the damn ship yourself!"  


Clarke watches them argue for a while longer, enveloped in Bellamy and the Octavia.  


Was it this ship they killed people on?  


She closes her eyes and leans over the banister, calls out to Diyoza.  


"You owe me, and you will let him come with us."  


Diyoza glares at her.   


"Come on, Charmaine. I'm sure you can find someone else who'd steer your ship for you willingly. Let him go."  


She does, but not without a threat.   


"You'll need me, Clarke Griffin. And I may not come to your aid."  


"Maybe," she accepts, smiles a smile that pulls her skin taut, makes her realize she is actually beaming. "But today, I just want to see my fucking crew happy."

***

They arrive to Xandria after almost two years of navigating, and they're all the worse for wear. But they are still happy to have finally made it to land.  
  


Bellamy offers her a hand and she takes it, feels solid ground for the first time in two months.   


It dizzies her, dislodges her.   


She was made for the sea, she realized somewhere between Bellamy beaming at her with her hands on the helm, and seeing strange lights in the water for the first time.  


"It's just the sirens, Clarke. They don't want us."  


This time, being on land makes her stomach twirl.   


There is a woman with long dark hair waiting for them out on the pier, smiling just like the siren on the ship named after her, and Clarke looks at Bellamy.  


He squeezes her hand.   


"It'll be fine."  


She takes a step forward.  


The rest of their life is waiting for them but she takes one look at their crew and their ship and realizes that it's not a goodbye.  


They are all sea people. They'll make their way back home in the end. 


	2. II. You With Your Bad Heart, Me With My Bad Head

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bellamy's got a bad heart, Clarke's got a bad head, but somehow they make it work. // Featuring: sailor tattoos, Bellarke dealing with their own heads, protective Clarke, and a lot of feelings.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everyone who expressed interest in seeing more chapters for this fic! I hope you'll enjoy this one too. :) 
> 
> The title comes from Zelda Fitzgerald's letter to F. Scott Fitzgerald: _"Won’t we be quite the pair?—you with your bad heart, me with my bad head. Together, though, we might have something worthwhile."_
> 
> It fits.
> 
> Enjoy!

_ And I'll use you as a makeshift gauge _

_ Of how much to give and how much to take _

_ Oh I'll use you as a warning sign _

_ That if you talk enough sense then you'll lose your mind _

** _Amber Run, I Found_ **

* * *

Clarke's got a bad head and Bellamy's got a bad heart so it is no wonder that he's standing out on the deck one night, looking forlorn as he tells her:

  
"I'm too old for you."

  
They do this sometimes. She falls asleep tangled in him and his sheets, only to find the bed cold when nightmares wake her up.  


During those nights, he stares into the vast sea surrounding them and pretends like he could ever let her go.  


"Sure, Bellamy. And you've got a really bad knee, too."  


She quips and jokes, crossing the distance between them until she can wrap her arms around his torso, press a kiss to the nape of his neck.  


He pretends he wants to let her go and she pretends like it doesn't bother her.  


"I'm serious, Clarke," he says but still intertwines his fingers with hers, squeezes harder. "What are we doing? You're so young. I've been through wars, I've- "  


"Killed people?" She hums into his back. His shirt is soaked through, August heat will slowly decompose them all. "So have I. We make quite the pair."  


They tiptoe around their histories. Clarke knows there are parts of him that he needs time to show, and she doesn't push the subject. In return, he doesn't ask what she dreamt when she wakes up covered in cold sweat, screaming so loud that even Raven can hear her in the machine room.  


Being on the Octavia is a second chance for everyone, their captain and his Clarke included.  


Some nights, Bellamy tries his best to tell her but he can't shove the words past his lips. He only hangs his head in shame.  


"Come back to bed. We'll think about it tomorrow."  


Defeated, he does. Kissing him then always feels a little too much like taking something from him.

***

They sail around Cape Horn and when Bellamy insists they dock in the first town on the coast, Clarke doesn't understand why.  


Then she follows him to a tattoo artist sitting on a crate of peaches on the pier, and she suddenly sees.  


He gets a full-rigged ship tattooed on his chest and Raven smirks when Clarke tells her all about it, Bellamy's curls soaked in sweat and sticking to his forehead, gritting his teeth through the pain and refusing to take her hand.  


"Why is he doing it if it hurts?"  


Raven prattles around the heating pipes, a new addition to the Octavia. The longer route meant more safety but it also meant a winter sailing through the Bering Sea. It would get cold again, even if the sweltering heat makes winter seem like a far-fetched dream.  


"It's a sailor thing, Clarke," Raven says finally. She smiles more these days, Zeke always there by her side, looking at her like she hung the moon. Clarke doesn't regret using Diyoza's favor to see Raven this happy.  


When it becomes clear Raven isn't going to tell her more, she asks Bellamy. During the day, they don't get a lot of time to talk. He may be the captain but they still have to keep this ship running.  


In the evening, they're too tired to do anything but talk. All the heat is wearing them down.  


"What's with the tattoos?"   


She's taken to mapping them. Swallows all over his shoulders, crossed cannons on his forearms. It never occurred to her that the tattoos were more than just a part of what Bellamy looked like.  


For a second, he still looks conflicted. It's started bothering her, the way he forces himself to be unsure of her when really, he's sure. She's sure. They both want to be here.  


His gaze softens then and he takes her hand, lets her run her fingers across the black ink interspersed with freckles.  


"They're an old tradition. Every sailor has them. Some of them are personal but the rest of them are like a story. They tell tales of a sailor's experience, the places they've visited. Some are more important than others. The full-rigged ship is for sailing around Cape Horn."  


"Very romantic."  


Bellamy chuckles, trailing a hand across her back lazily.  


"A part of it, sure. The practical part is that the captain knows they've got an experienced sailor if they need to sail that route."

Clarke hums, flipping over on his chest to inspect the nautical star on his shoulder. Her softness gets the better of her and she kisses it, fond of this man and his stories.  


When she looks up, he looks so peaceful that something in her cracks.  


"The star is so a sailor can always find their way home," he whispers, pressing her closer to him. Some days they just stay like that, impossibly close and unmoving. Blink and they'll be gone.  


So they don't blink.  


"The cannons?"  


"Naval service. For your mom, if I remember correctly."  


He came to get her. He came to get her, even if she didn't think he would. She infuriated him, demeaned him, said ugly things just to get a reaction of him but still… He was there to take her home.  


"What was it like?"  


She talks so she wouldn't cry. The want, the desire to know him and be inside him and be him just closer closer _ closer- _it's making her chest constrict with not-quite-bitterness.  


"The Navy?" He looks up as she looks away, listens to him breathe and the ship creak all around them. "I was drunk and fighting half the time. The other half I was…"  


Fucking, but he doesn't say that. He never seems to, not around her. Always cherry-picking his words for her.  


"Wasn't that when Sancta happened?"  


"Yeah. Everyone on the ship was drunk out of their minds. Suddenly, they were firing at us from across the strait. We had no idea what was happening. Shumway, my commanding officer, was the first to jump ship. I suppose you want the rest of the _ heroic _story too, huh?"  


"I want-" _ whatever you can give me_. "The story you remember, if that's okay."  


"It's not very heroic. It just sounded like it. I was the highest ranking officer when Shumway got away. They were firing on us sporadically but we couldn't see them so I presumed they must've been trigger-happy scouts. Our best shot was taking them down. Otherwise, we'd be dead.  


"It was a miracle we didn't sink. Drunk and scared. We managed to round the strait and face them head on."  


The rest was history. Both sides took heavy losses but the rest of the Navy was sailing out and no one on the shore was harmed.  


Clarke squeezes his hand and Bellamy presses an absentminded kiss to the top of her head.   


"I played it off like I was a winner. In reality, I was just lucky."  


They let the words sink in, neither caring much to break the silence. Maybe he was right. Maybe he _ is _too old for her.  


This time, she pushes, something ugly creeping up her spine. With every tale he tells, he moves farther away. She's holding him but he's not here with her. Not anymore.  


"Why did you come and get me?"  


It takes him a beat to look at her and _ see _ her. Always caught up in a world behind his eyes, a world she can't see. A part of her thinks she shouldn't have to help him. The other, louder, part of her wants to help him anyway.  


"Clarke," he pleads but she's unrelenting. Stares him down until he releases her, hurtles himself out of the bed and braces himself against his desk.   


One of the first things she thought about him was that he looked like an exile. But the exile is as much in his head as it is in the borders.  


"If you think you're too old, too tired. Why did you come and get me? You could've let me go home to Arkadia."  


They no longer fight. It's just him taking grazes for punches.   


"Maybe I should have. You'd have been happier there." She tries not to let it get to her but it does. It always does, when he's saying it. "Why do you want to be here?"  


"That's easy," she flashes him a simple smile as his eyes widen. "I like working on the Octavia. I like being with the crew. I love being with you."  


She feels like she belongs. Like she's at home. The ship has its faults, and so do the people on it. That doesn't make them any less worthy.  


Bellamy's knuckles go white when she says it, his jaw locking. He's begging her not to go there but she feels better these days, brave enough to be haughty and wear her heart on her sleeve.  


"Clarke…"  


"I love being with you, Bellamy. Does that bother you? You can't change it anyway. It's something that's about me. Not about you." She smiles as he grimaces in pain, knows that sometimes you need a flood to wash you clean, even if it hurts.  


_ Especially _when it hurts.  


"I love being with you on this ship, where something is always breaking down. I love the chaos, love our crew, love when we get drunk and we're shameless, love when it's so cold I get frostbite, I love this. I love _ you_."  


It comes out of her like a song and she's laughing by the time she's done, naked and graceless in his bed, hair all over, skin so warm it burns.

She's laughing when he finally, finally kisses her like he's got nothing to hold back anymore. She laughs into his mouth and into his skin, and he catches on, starts laughing with her like he's drunk, the rumble of his laugh vibrating on her skin, the sweetness of the tears in his eyes making her cheeks wet.  


"I told you not to say it."  


"I know," she presses out, laughs again when he reaches for her sides and starts tickling her, the bed shaking with their glee. "But oh, you should have seen your face, Bellamy!"   


He was looking at her like he was going to kill her or kiss her and it was such a gorgeous sight that it made her flood with joy she hasn't felt in a long time.  


"So you love me, huh?" he teases, kissing his way down her breasts, getting heat all over her skin until she's sticky and aching. "You gonna say that again, Princess?"  


"I love you, I love you, I-"  


She could go on all day but he silences her with his mouth on hers, smiles like the sun when she opens her eyes and catches him hovering above.  


"I love you too, Clarke. That's why I came for you."  


_ So let's love each other_, she thinks. _ Let's love each other like ordinary people do. _

***

He takes her to the same tattoo artist the next day, making Murphy groan in frustration.  
  


"Can't you two make up your fucking minds? Two same dockings in a row, what the _ fuck_."  


But Clarke doesn't care. She gives the woman her hands and it hurts, this sharp stinging pain, as she tattooes the letters on her knuckles:  
  


_ Hold fast.  
_

"For a good grip in the rigging," Bellamy explained when she insisted she get a tattoo. Now the ink looks strange on her skin but it's a good kind of strange.  


Clarke bites her cheek and Bellamy cups it in his palm. "What's wrong, Princess?"  


"What else? What else can I get?"  


He cocks an eyebrow at her, incredulous.   


"Well, what else do you want?"  


"Everything."  


She gets a rope on her wrist and smirks all the way through the pain. Her skin is red and itchy and she pours seawater on it immediately.  


"It means I'm a deckhand!" she proudly tells anyone who wants to listen, showing off her hand.   


"Love, that's not a good thing to be," Bellamy whispers into her hair, smiling at her with amusement glinting in his eyes. The townspeople are looking at them funny but Clarke doesn't care, she's been drunk on life since last night and has no intention of sobering up.  


"Why not?"  


"Because you're the captain's partner. You should be lounging, not working."  


She doesn't care. She loves the work. Loves the muscles growing, giving her enough strength to love and hope and laugh without constantly fearing that she will lose it all.  


"Can I get another one?"  


They run out of tattoos to get her. The woman with the needle and the ink laughs with pockets full of gold when they wave from the Octavia.   


Clarke watches her tattoos when she works. The ink may not give her a good grip, but it's only because she's had it for a long time.  


In the evenings, she sits with Raven in the galley and drinks rum, watching the shade fall on the rope on her wrist.  


"You're fascinated by them, huh?"  


Clarke nods. "There's this whole culture I don't know a thing about."  
  


"It's mostly just rum and puking overboard, Clarke."  


"_Culture_," she hisses back, making Raven laugh and tilt her cup at Clarke.  
  


With time, she learns all of their stories. She and Raven have to get preposterously drunk for Raven to start spilling the truth, but they get there.  


To the brace she got when a crew member she was in love with shot her through the floor. To the day she set foot on the Octavia, so tired and angry that they had to bring rum and scrap metal to her like an offering to some furious goddess.  


To the day she realized she would always have the sea and the fire, at least.  


"You don't need legs to fix things."  


Her childhood, golden, as she tells Clarke about the little prince she loved somewhere in the canals of Sancta. The little prince who went off to marry a princess and left her with a few pretty words.  
  


"_I love you_," she spat. "You could tell a mast you loved it."  
  


And finally, to present day when her head was in Clarke's lap, her fingers carding through Raven's shining hair.  


"If I say I'm grateful often enough, will that actually make me realize how good my life is?"  


Clarke smiles.  


"Maybe."  
  


She's still trying to figure it out herself.

***

It's November when they dock again, tottering off the ship like they only grew legs yesterday. Her coat isn't warm enough, her hands are so cold they hurt.  
  


They make it quick, agreeing to meet in the tavern at nightfall.  


"Only a little while longer and then we'll have crossed the Equator," Bellamy promises, holding her close as they make their way to the market. He pretends she's in need of protection and she lets him do it. Sometimes it feels good to feel protected.  


She'll get a tattoo out of it, she knows. Just for crossing that strange line where Murphy and Jasper promise sharks come biting at the sides of ships, their jaws gaping wide for deckhands who lean a little too far.  


They're picking meat to stock when she hears the words.   


Clarke turns first, something that later makes her wonder, and only then does Bellamy follow.  


"_Hakeldama_."  
  


Her stomach plummets as a woman points an accusing finger at Bellamy, teeth bared, feral.  


"You're a murderer and a pirate, Bellamy Blake! You are never going to be forgiven for Hakeldama. I hope you rot-"  


The market is frozen when Clarke closes the distance between them and grabs the woman by her throat, presses hard enough for her to stop talking.  
  


Everyone is looking at them but Clarke is looking at her right hand - _ Hold _ \- around the woman's neck.   


"I would go home if I were you. I would go home and I would wash that filth off your tongue," Clarke whispers, her blood running cold. "The world is full of murderers and pirates. Bellamy Blake is none of your concern."  


The woman lands on the floor with a thud when Clarke lets her go, picking at her skirts and furs as she drags herself away.  


The townspeople are staring at her, still. When she looks at Bellamy, she sees shock and pain and realization all coming together in a mask that's cracking at the seams.  
  


She takes the meat and takes his hand, getting them away.  


"The girl was right," an old woman, a beggar, says just as they're about to leave. "He has sinned."  


Next to her, all the muscles in Bellamy's body lock. He goes stock still. Something in him is always fighting between throwing the first stone himself and running away.  


"He has," Clarke allows, dropping a silver coin in the woman's cup. It rattles something in both of them. "But he is redeeming himself."  


On the ship, he finally asks:  


"You know?"  
  


She can see it all running through his head. How he looked at her when she held the woman by her throat. The glances on their quiet way back.  


Now, he looks torn, wrecked. The way he hasn't looked for months. Love was good on him, love broke him and remade him softer.  


"Diyoza told me. I have known ever since she took me."  


The counter in his head starts off. How many months, how many moments, all the while -  


"You knew all this time and you said nothing."  


It's warm enough. She unwinds her scarf, places it on a chair next to her.  


"It didn't matter. It changed nothing," she replies, cocking her head. He's frustrated with her, with everything. Clarke just feels calm.  


"You mean to tell me you knew I killed three hundred people in Hakeldama and it meant _ nothing _ to you?"  


She picks at her nails, the black ink on her knuckles inviting her to tell the truth.  


"The first night, I was disgusted. Second, I was angry. Third, I realized it was all just because I didn't hear it from you first."  


His fist goes straight through the wall. Steam is hissing everywhere, drenching his hair, burning her skin.  


"You heard what I told the woman. I know you killed them. _ You _know you killed them. So what good is it to kill yourself too?"  


He stares at her, burns forming on his knuckles. Raven would have their head for the damage.  


"You can never undo it, but you're doing better. I'm not going to make excuses for you, but I will offer you forgiveness. If that's what you need."  
  


She wished someone had offered _ her _ forgiveness. Maybe she would have still been in the ruined castle now. Instead, her mother cried for her soul and she grew emptiness in her chest like a rosebush.   


Then she realizes that someone did. This ship did. It bound her to the Octavia, to the crew. People who knew what she did and loved her anyway.  


People who knew what Bellamy did and loved him anyway.  


"You'd do that for me?" he asks at last, voice rough with silence and anguish.  


Clarke laughs mirthlessly. "There isn't anything I wouldn't do for you, Bellamy. You're a good man, despite it all."  
  


Maybe he wouldn't love her anymore, knowing she wasn't disgusted for all the right reasons - knowing that her anger had quickly turned into sadness.   


What a wicked way to bring a good man down to his knees.  


"I thought they were going to kill her, Clarke. I thought they were going to kill Octavia and all of us. Xandria was so small and wounded and I-"  


She listens to the apologies and stories pouring in. Some of it is the truth, she knows. The rest are the truths he created to live with himself.   


And it is fine by her, as long as he _ does _ live with himself. As long as he takes a seat next to her and tells her what he remembers, lets it all out like a baptism under the hissing steam.  
  


The water has always washed them clean.  


Why should it be any different now?  


Clarke watches Bellamy Blake break and even though he's choking on tears that won't come out, she thinks he's never looked more whole.  


He falls asleep after hours and hours of talking. She listens to him, doesn't interrupt. There are things he says and looks at her like he's waiting for her to leave, but she doesn't. Maybe she's as bad he was, she doesn't know. She stays because everyone needs someone to witness their truth.  


Raven comes shouting and banging when she discovers the mess they left in the galley but one look at Clarke's face is enough for her to go perilously still and ask, "What happened?"  


"Hakeldama."  


"He told you?"  


"I knew."  


When she tells Raven everything, the mechanic promises to fix the pipes.  


In the bed, Bellamy is sleeping, barely breathing. His body is cold when Clarke wraps herself around him, breathing him in.  


Maybe it isn't right, but it feels right.   


The things he did yesterday were not the things he would do tomorrow. They'd both believed they were doing the best they could and if they were wrong, well… It was just another thing to live with.  


He turns to her in the middle of the night, reaches for her waist and pulls her closer. Murmurs, "I love you."  


She knows, she's always known.  


Maybe it isn't right but if she's being honest, she doesn't even care. She's talked enough sense and lost her mind.  


Now she goes with her heart and she sleeps at night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for reading! A few things:
> 
> 1) Sailor tattoos are actually historically accurate, meanings and all. I got it from [this illustration](https://www.demilked.com/sailor-tattoo-meaning-lucy-bellwood/) and knew the symbolism had to be included in this fic. 
> 
> 2) What even is geography and sea currents? Let's just ignore maps and roll with it. 
> 
> 3) Finally, [Amber Run's song "I Found"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yj6V_a1-EUA) reminded me of this fic so much that one of the last lines marks that. Listen to it. I swear it's going to make you feel things. 
> 
> 4) I have a HC that gruff captain Bellamy Blake calls his Clarke "love" and this is the hill I will die on.
> 
> 5) **More chapters are coming!** I'm paying attention to the things you guys mention in the comments so if there's something you'd like me to cover - let me know! 
> 
> That's that! 
> 
> Thank you so much for reading and please let me know what you thought!  
**Kudos and comments are better than rum**, and I'm on Tumblr [@marauders-groupie](https://marauders-groupie.tumblr.com/tagged/atlas%20hands) too!


	3. III. Our Dead Drink the Sea

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> When Murphy doesn't return from a supply run, old secrets come to light and put the crew in danger.
> 
> *  
_"We're not leaving anyone else behind."_
> 
> _"Clarke, I'm the captain. If I say we're all-"_
> 
> _She throws her head back, lets out a mirthless laugh. Her hand in his palm feels like a sham._
> 
> _What a joke, this love._
> 
> _"You may be the captain, Bellamy, but I'm in charge."_

To Bellamy, protecting her comes first.

So when they pull on the ropes binding her wrists, Clarke wants to laugh.

Don't they know he'll have their heads for this?

"A princess is a pretty prize," she hears Wallace say. Next to her, Murphy's brow is bleeding and he's shooting her apologetic looks.

"And a traitor to the crown is an even better one," the woman shadowing him responds.

Their knees are still in the sand when skies are cleaved open and rain comes pouring down.

There is so much their captors don't know. And despite her swollen eye, despite the cut in her side oozing blood, Clarke laughs.

She laughs and laughs as rain comes down on their broken bodies.

*

_Two weeks earlier_

They've been waiting for Murphy just off the coast of Reva for days.

"What the fuck happened?" Emori demands, leaning overboard to get a better look. Their boat is shrouded in mist but they can still see the beacon burning on.

Bellamy tenses next to Clarke, but he doesn't say a word.

"Emori, I'm sure he's fine. It's Murphy," Clarke tries, only for the woman to whirl around with a dangerous look on her face.

"He may be Murphy to you. To me, he's my _husband."_

She spits the words out, barely stopping herself from slapping Clarke. The worst part is that Clarke understands her.

If it were Bellamy who had gone missing, she would be even worse.

"Alright. Let's think about this," she proposes, clearing the table on the deck and taking a seat. It's where Bellamy usually sits whenever they're strategizing. 

Now he stands behind her, his palm barely touching her sweater, and Clarke can see the storm brewing in his eyes.

There is so much they have yet to discuss. Neither of them are in a rush. There's always something more pressing, their crew, their journey.

It makes sense.

"What could've happened to him? Does he have any enemies in Reva?"

"It's Murphy," Raven deadpans. "He has enemies everywhere." Then, after Emori reaches for her boot - where she keeps her knife, she clears her throat. "I don't know. Bellamy?"

All eyes are on him now and Clarke knows a part of him loves it, a part of him just wants to hide. She looks at him and sees a man cleaved in half, two sides that can't ever be reconciled.

"We'll wait one more day. If he's not back by then, we're leaving."

Clarke's stomach plummets and Emori starts protesting, reaching for Bellamy who stops her by catching her wrist in his hand.

Something's wrong, and Clarke knows it. She just doesn't know what until she's leaving to get Emori tea and food - both of them keeping watch on the deck for the rickety old row boat that Murphy left in - and sees Bellamy and Raven.

They're speaking in hushed tones but it sounds like they're arguing. 

For a second, Clarke wants to burst in and demand to know what's happening. Then she thinks better of it and ducks behind a corner, pressing herself against a wall and barely breathing so she can hear.

"You know what we did in Eden's Pass, Bellamy! If you think Nia forgot, you're wrong. We knew the risks. Reva is practically her territory and Murphy knows too much. It's why we sent-"

Raven's brace clinks against the floor.

"Did you hear that?"

"There's no one here, Raven. As for Queen Nia, she'd be a long way from home. Why not just intercept us and kill everyone on board?"

"It's not her style. You know how she operates. We should just leave. It's Murphy she wants."

Clarke's blood boils. _It's Murphy she wants_, as though Murphy is not one of them. 

She gets up before she even knows what she's doing, rounds the corner and comes straight for them.

Bellamy's face falls and Raven goes stiff, a stance that offers no compromise.

So this is the Octavia. Secrecy and plotting.

"We're not leaving Murphy behind," Clarke says. Raven wants to protest but she raises a hand, locks eyes with Bellamy. "Are we clear?"

He nods.

"Good. Now, I think you owe us all the truth."

*

It was a covert mission. It was how they met. 

Queen Nia of the Ice Nation once had Octavia's territory, so who better than two native Xandrians, Raven and Murphy, to start working on the Queen Octavia and make sure Nia reclaimed what she thought was rightfully hers?

"The access to information was priceless," Raven mutters, gritting her teeth. The galley is warm, windows all fogged up and the entire room reeking of rum. Even Emori left her post to hear this.

"They decimated our army in a week."

Raven nods, grim.

"I was good with technology, Murphy was good at being quiet. We knew everything by the time Bellamy found out."

It took him a month to realize who the spies were. By then, Xandria was practically defenseless, his sister, their queen, the only thing keeping them together.

"We came forward with information. We both knew there would be hell to pay but we were both alone. Our loyalties lay with no one. We could've used the money."

"Why did you change your mind?" Clarke asks.

Raven smiles at her then, this quiet, tired expression. They've all grown older in the past few months.

"Because we belonged. Sentimental, right?" She picks at the splintered wood, comes away with dust on her fingers. "We didn't want the money. We had a-"

She swallows, hard, and Clarke knows how that sentence ends.

_Family._

This ship haunts her too.

"So you're willing to leave him behind after all that?" Emori asks, incredulous. 

Neither Bellamy nor Raven speak. They don't even meet Emori's eye.

Clarke understands both. Raven is afraid and Bellamy wants to keep the rest of his crew safe.

She takes a deep breath and picks at her sweater for a second, before looking back up at Bellamy and Raven, sitting so close on the bench that their shoulders are pressed together.

When have they started taking sides?

"When Diyoza took me, Murphy came with you. He didn't protest, didn't question it. I know because him and I, we're cockroaches. We survive. But John Murphy, he survived more than he should have. We have that in common, and I am not leaving him."

Emori uncurls next to her. 

"Fine, we'll go-" Bellamy starts but Clarke smiles at him, shakes her head.

"You're not going anywhere. You and Raven need to contact my mother. She has men stationed in Reva, they'll get the message across." Bellamy motions to speak and she silences him again. She is so, so tired, but she knows this is right. 

This is what must be done.

"I know this is not the whole truth. I don't care what dirty job you," and here she looks at Bellamy directly, "sent him to do, but it stops now. Emori and I are going to get him. You're going to wait here and get my mother. You've done enough."

She gets up and away from the table, her boots thudding heavily against the ship's floor.

_You should always treat ships with kindness_, Murphy told her once, caressing the side of the Octavia. He used to pretend to sing with her as he cooked, hip checked the old counters like dancing with a friend.

They were going to _leave _him.

"Raven, give Emori all the guns you can spare. If you don't have any, we'll figure it out ourselves."

Then she leaves, walking through the corridors to her and Bellamy's quarters like muscle memory. This ship was good on them, this crew was good on her.

She doesn't want to have to fashion crosses out of driftwood on deserted islands to give them a semblance of a decent departure.

She doesn't want to lose anyone anymore.

"Clarke!"

She ignores Bellamy, keeps walking until her fingers have reached the brass handle of his - _their _\- quarters.

"Clarke," his voice is demanding and the grip he has on her hand is enough to hurt. "Will you stop? Please?"

He turns her around so she has no other option but to look him straight in the eye, see all the wreckage there.

This wreckage, too, she's had enough of.

"We're not leaving anyone else behind."

"Clarke, I'm the captain. If I say we're all-"

She throws her head back, lets out a mirthless laugh. Her hand in his palm feels like a sham.

What a joke, this love.

"You may be the captain, Bellamy, but I'm in charge."

*

"They're still smuggling for Octavia," Emori tells her when they're in the second row boat, the paddles forming calluses on their hands.

Raven and Bellamy, as well as the rest of their crew, are looking on from the ship. Clarke can imagine the disapproval in their eyes.

Before, she would have been uncomfortable leaving him when they've fought. Clarke would scramble to hear forgiveness cross his lips, to touch him one more time. Just in case.

But now she looks at Bellamy, clutching the rail of the Octavia, and she knows he's angry. She is angry. But it changes nothing, and both of them know it. Even if something happened, the love would remain.

Fury or not.

"I know."

Of course she knows. Every book on the ship is coded, half of the gunpowder barrels are filled to the brim with jewels.

She knows.

"John told me he had to meet with someone on the coast. Echo, I think."

Clarke remembers the name faintly. 

"One of Azgeda spies?"

Emori nods.

"Queen Nia's favorite little murderer."

At that, Clarke laughs bitterly, rows forward so forcefully that Emori's paddles hit her in the wrists and she raises her eyebrows.

"Hey, take it easy."

"I'm sorry. I know who she is. She used to be in our court, too." Clarke remembers it now. The girl, barely a few years older than Clarke, a part of a diplomatic mission. 

She looked so pretty with ribbons in her hair, only for Clarke to find her driving a knife between a guard's ribs.

She was gone before Clarke even had the time to alert her mother to the traitor in their midst. They all knew the risks but forgot that Queen Nia trained children.

No one would ever suspect them.

"We'll always be pirates," Emori finally says. "I don't think there is a way around that."

Bellamy's had to wash every golden coin he needed to spend. Clarke would find the sink covered in bloodstains.

She didn't care. Now, as haunted by this ship as the rest of them, haunted by the man pulled apart between responsibility and the need to be anything but, it all feels like a lie.

"I know."

The mist descends on them again and they don't speak of it anymore.

*

When she sees Jackson, Clarke smiles. When Jackson sees Clarke, he kneels.

It's a strange reminder of her past. A year ago, she was a princess of the kingdom he swore he would protect. 

Now she looks at herself and only sees a sailor.

"It's so good to see you, Jackson," she tells him, reaching for him despite the guards eyeing them warily. He returns the hug, even pecks her cheek.

"I can't believe you're in Reva, of all places." He steps away and gives her a once over. His eyes stop at the tattoos marking her knuckles. "So you're definitely a sailor now."

Emori clears her throat then, and Clarke remembers what they came for, the smile slipping off her face.

"We need your help."

He buys them both wine in the tavern and waits patiently for Clarke to finish the story. It's vague, but it's all she's got.

Before, she didn't mind Bellamy keeping secrets. She trusted him enough to know that if he wasn't telling her something, it was to keep her safe.

But she doesn't want to be kept safe anymore. Not if it means being kept in the dark.

"Well, I don't know a lot. But I can tell you that Echo of Azgeda came by five days ago and left this morning."

"Where did she go?"

"Officially, we have no idea." Then he lowers his voice, smiles as he adds, "She went back home."

"On a ship?"

Jackson shakes his head. "Land. She had a convoy outside the city limits. There were fifteen of them when they came. Sixteen when they left."

Clarke nods, takes a sip of her wine.

"It's John, right?" Emori asks, hopeful.

"I think so, yes." Then she turns to Jackson, already thinking about catching up with Echo and Murphy. "Bellamy will come tomorrow if we don't return. I told him to send for my mother. I am no longer a princess. You don't have to help us. But if you do, I'll be grateful."

Jackson smiles wearily. "Clarke, I don't care if you're not a princess. Not even your mom cares."

"How is she?"

He smiles ruefully. "Tired. She misses you."

A part of Clarke misses her mother, too. But Arkadia no longer feels like home. If it came to it, she would lay down her life for her people, but she would not live to rule over them.

She hugs Jackson goodbye and Emori finds two horses that look reliable enough to ride. It's not what they imagined but it's what they have. 

They set off through the plains without supplies and without a plan. 

Emori rides like demons are chasing after her and Clarke doesn't have it in her heart to stop her. If it was Bellamy that was taken, she wouldn't do the same.

She would do worse.

They don't sleep until the night falls so thick not even their horses can see. 

It's only then that Emori accepts camping for the night and they use their saddles in place of pillows, huddle together to keep warm.

"How did you two meet?" Clarke asks. If she falls asleep, she will dream of flesh burning in Polis. 

So she doesn't. Thinks of her crew instead.

"I robbed him blind one night," Emori says, mirth crinkling in her eyes. "In the morning, I found him lying in a gutter. Someone finished the job."

She inhales sharply and then visibly relaxes, growing softer with memories.

"I took pity on him and nursed him back to health. The first few months, we were waiting for one to double-cross the other. It never happened."

"Was that before or after his mission?"

"After. He wouldn't stay on the Octavia. When Bellamy found out about Nia, he wanted to hang John. But then Bellamy needed to smuggle a lot of gold past your mom's barricades and well… No one could do the job like John and I could."

She shoots Clarke a mischievous smile and that's when it hits her. Emori and Murphy function perfectly. They're always there but quietly, an inseparable duo. 

They could live without the other, but they preferred staying together.

"When did you get married?"

At that, Emori laughs outright. "We were so drunk. It was a few months before you came on board, actually. We were stuck in ice up north, no way to sail for _weeks._ We were running so low on food that we considered catching seagulls. Then a rickey boat came out of nowhere." She smiles with the memory, wide and open. "There's a custom on the sea. When a boat approaches you, you have to give them a pot full of wine.

"We didn't have shit to give but Bellamy gave the men our weight in gold. We couldn't stop laughing when we finally set sail. And then it made sense. We got married in the next port. John didn't want Bellamy to officiate."

"Obviously."

Emori grins back. "Obviously."

They lie in silence for a while after that. 

"What about you and Bellamy?"

"Are we trading love stories now?" Clarke asks, raises an eyebrow. Emori meets her gaze and she chuckles. "I never thought about the future."

"It's going to come sooner than you think. Provided we survive this."

They laugh for a while after that, and then they go quiet. Emori falls asleep and Clarke teeters on the precipice between falling asleep and staying awake, the place where she feels safest.

She's never thought about their future. What would it even look like on a ship? Just the two of them, growing old and growing gray until they're training new deck hands and mess mates?

Until they're giving their friends a sea burial?

Or maybe there could be a hearth to come back to. Children growing up on sea salt and stories. Making friends in ports, slipping on the deck and scraping their knees.

Clarke turns on her side and curls into herself, traces the rope tattoo on her wrist. His deckhand. Her captain.

It's more than that, she knows. But no matter how hard she tries, she can't imagine a future where she and Bellamy are not tired, are not worn thin by the wind, are capable of imagining a life that is more than survival.

In every version of their future, Clarke only sees shared loneliness.

*

They reach Echo's convoy the next night. Clarke's bones hurt from staying upright on the horse and the circles under Emori's eyes are already pitch black.

The Ice Nation is sleeping on a ship tonight, the windows alive with light. When they come to stand behind a corner, they both know they have no chance of succeeding.

"If they're Azgeda warriors, they'll kill us before we even open fire," Clarke tells her, rubbing her hands together to keep warm.

"I just want to know if he's alive." 

Emori sounds desperate and Clarke sighs. "Fine. Then we wait."

"Thank you."

_Thank me if we make it out alive, _Clarke wants to say. They're miles away from the port they docked in, the ship they made their home.

And now there's another ship, albeit a merchant one. It's small, fast, reminds Clarke of Diyoza's. The flags are all wrong, though. 

This ship sails under many.

They wait for hours, nearly falling asleep on the cold street, when the night is pierced by a scream.

Emori rips out of her sleep and looks at Clarke, wide eyed.

"I know. Wait here."

Clarke crosses the street with her hood up, looking like any other sailor in the port. When she's sure no one on the ship can see her, she scales the side, wraps her legs around the figure on the bow.

A two-headed deer.

It makes her blood freeze over. It's _wrong_.

"We might as well have fun, right?" a man's voice spills through an open window. Clarke climbs a little farther up, checks the deck and then launches herself on it.

The floorboards creak under her weight and she stays quiet.

No one comes.

"It's not like we'll be able to sleep. She's going to be torturing him well into the night," the man continues in a lazy drawl. 

Ten cabins, a mess hall, a powerful engine in the hull. Clarke makes a mental note of the ship's characteristics. It would outrun the Octavia any day, but it's not a battleship.

"Cage…" the second voice, female, joins now. "We're just here to get our money and get out. Don't forget that."

Another scream pierces the night and the pair slams their window shut, switches the light off. 

There's no one out there so Clarke descends into the hull, creeps through the hallway. So Echo's convoy isn't Azgeda. 

It's good news.

"Where are they? Are they still in Reva?"

"Fuck. _You._"

Another scream.

Clarke briefly considers her options. Bellamy would be right behind them if Emori alerts him to where they were going. Jackson and his men, too. Her mother would start a war to get her back. Bellamy would, too.

And she's a princess. She'd be more worth to them alive.

Clarke makes sure she has a plan because that right there was Murphy's voice and it's not only that she promised Emori they would get them back, but she also has to get him home safe and sound.

Every voice in her head is telling her to protect her people, no matter the cost.

So Clarke does the only thing she can, thinks of Bellamy and their broken, happy family on the Queen Octavia all the while.

She opens the door and comes face to face with Echo of Azgeda.

The girl has turned into a woman, and her stomach turns at the sight of Echo's war paint, white stained with specks of blood.

Murphy's blood.

"Heya, Clarke. Took you long enough."

Murphy smiles at her through bloody teeth. She hears a whip, and then it's pain.

Then it's darkness. 

Nothing at all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was on a vacation in a fishing town this summer and met the most interesting man. He told me about a seafaring tradition called: "pot."
> 
> According to him, whenever you were out on the sea and a boat approached you, you would have to give them a pot full of wine or whatever you had on board. They still uphold that tradition in the town, and I was so charmed by it. I knew I had to incorporate it in Atlas Hands. :)
> 
> Stay tuned for chapter 4: Bellamy's PoV!
> 
> p.s. yes, had to reupload this chapter. the content is still the same, i'm sorry for the confusion!


	4. IV. Careful Fear and Dead Devotion

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After Murphy and Clarke were kidnapped by the Azgeda, Bellamy and the rest of the crew set in search of them. But there are some things you can't come back from, and it's up to Bellamy to redeem himself.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm happy to say that this fic is finished! I'll be posting the final chapter 5 next week.
> 
> It took me a while, I know. I was putting it off because I just didn't want to be done with this story, which contained so many elements personally meaningful to me.
> 
> Still, thank you for tagging along for this ride, and I hope you'll like this one, too.
> 
> Have fun!

_ "Everything I love is on the table,  
_ _Everything I love is out to sea._

_ I have only two emotions,  
_ _Careful fear and dead devotion."_

**The National**

* * *

God had given him a rare woman, and did he love her well?

They receive news of Clarke at first light, Emori docking off the boat, and sliding across the slippery deck until she reaches Raven’s sturdy hands. Her eyes are fixed on Bellamy, and Clarke is nowhere to be seen.

He doesn’t need to be told what happened for his heart to sink.

“She’s on the ship. She’s - “

Raven doesn’t stop looking at him, either, fury and grief mixing in her eyes until Bellamy wants to cower. But he’s not a man who does that, not anymore. When he hesitates, his people get hurt.

So now he nods.

Now he unfolds the maps hidden in the cabinet behind his desk. The same desk Clarke spread herself across, demanding answers, demanding equality on the Octavia. 

The same desk where he, for better or for worse, decided to fall in love with her.

“This is how we save them.”

*

They find them too late.

The Dead Zone is eerily quiet, the fog enveloping the small sandy island. Wherever he looks, Bellamy can only see sand and blood and sand and-

“Over here!”

Emori calls to him from the lighthouse. The last time anyone stepped foot here must’ve been ages ago, right after Hakeldama. This is where they signed the treaty. This is where they buried the dead whose names, nor sides, they did not know. 

“Look, that’s got to be Clarke’s,” Emori says, pointing at something in the sand. When Bellamy drops to his knees, he can see the delicate roses carved into the hilt of the dagger. Arkadia’s sigil.

Her sigil.

“It’s hers,” he says through gritted teeth, his insides twisting, twisting, marking him hers through and through. He doesn’t know if she’s dead or alive, but he knows that the first time he’d seen her, he knew she was a survivor.

You could smell it, if you were the same.

“Why would they come here?” Miller asks, frowning in the lantern’s gleam. “Maybe Jackson was wrong.”

Jackson, the head of Arkadia’s Royal Guard, had told them where their spies had last seen Azgeda and Echo. They also told them that Mount Weather was involved, but it was a long way from home for them. 

Still, people like Cage Wallace, dethroned and debased, would do anything to come out on top again.

Bellamy should know. He was just like Wallace.

“He wasn’t. Give me the torch.”

Bellamy knows where to look because he’d been here before, and perhaps because he’d been here before with the one person who should’ve had no place by his side. But those were darker times, how was he to know that the sides would change again and again?

Even to his own ears, his apologies sound weak. 

Clarke needs him.

They find the patterns in the sand behind the lighthouse, a simple lock on the trapdoor - recently broken. 

“I can smell sea salt and rust,” Raven tells him, her fingers brushing against her nose. She nods, and Bellamy pulls at the hatch, the door opening with a creak.

For a second, no one moves.

Then, there’s movement inside, and Bellamy hurtles into the darkness, forgetting the torch, and navigating the narrow passage by memory alone. 

“Clarke!”

Raven told him he was a coward, yesterday. _ You let her go. You could’ve gone with her. _

_ I was just trying to save what little we had left, _ he tried. 

But they were family. If one of them was missing, everyone was missing. He should’ve known that.

“Murphy! Are you there?” he shouts into the dark hollow. There’s not a trace of light, but he can still hear the footfalls - not behind him, but ahead, in the tunnels.

The last time he was there, there was still blood in the sand and dirt, her hands warm on him, reaching everywhere with bloodlust-driven fervor. They’d killed, and then they fucked. It was the way of the warrior.

But he could never keep it up. It’s why she left, and it’s why she’s now come back.

“Come on, Echo! Let’s end this! It’s me you want, not Murphy! Not Clarke!”

The air shifts. A movement to his left, and then the cool kiss of metal against his neck.

_ Always too fast for him. _

“You’re overestimating yourself, Blake.”

“And you’re defying your queen’s orders,” he shoots back into the darkness. Her body is warm against his, but she’s just a ghost - same as him. “This was never about Nia and Azgeda, was it?”

The knife is gone. Behind him, he can hear Raven’s voice, Miller’s nearby. 

“This way!”

He doesn’t wait for them to catch up. Instead, he presses on. He knows where Echo went, he knows where she’s keeping them. And the only one he’s afraid for is Clarke, so he moves forward on buckling knees, with arms bearing muscles that forgot the memory of fighting.

If it comes down to it, could he defend her? 

Or is he another shell of a man who survives on his past glory?

“Blake! Wait up!”

The last chamber on the right is vast, but golden hair is his only focal point.

Golden hair and so much blood.

“Clarke!”

He acts on instinct, reaching for her, only to lose balance and fall to his knees. On his right, Echo is holding the end of the chain with one hand. On his left, Cage Wallace is grinning down at him.

“He’s so predictable. Was he always this predictable? I can’t believe we lost the battle-”

“Shut up,” Echo growls. 

For a second, Bellamy thinks she has no idea what she’s doing. There’s five of them on her side; Echo, Wallace, and three of Azgeda warriors who he remembers from the last time they were there.

But they have six.

They have six, including Clarke, peering at him with wild eyes, and blood trickling down from her brow to her cheeks. He hadn’t seen her for a month and it’s still there. It’s still there, the animal fighting to reach for her, and keep her safe.

Bellamy only prays for Miller to be smart enough to stop at the right moment, at the chamber’s door.

“Are you alone?” Echo asks, looking around them like ghosts are going to step out of the shadows.

Bellamy nods.

“They wouldn’t come with me.”

Clarke’s eyes widen imperceptibly, but then she must realize. Her foot touches Murphy’s in the dirt. He looks worse than her, but he does his best to smirk.

Hardly a year, and everyone respects her more than him. 

“They never did like you,” Echo says, smirking. She pulls on the chain, and he sinks deeper into the sand. “But I’m glad you’re here.”

She crosses the few steps between them, the chain still glistening in her palm. Her hand is warm on his cheek. 

“I missed you, Bellamy.”

His eyes never leave Clarke’s. He can see everything unfolding in them, like stormy grey mirrors showing him who he really is. 

The man who slept with his enemy. The man who bandaged his sister’s wounds, and then fell to her would-be assassin’s bed.

The man who let the only woman who stood up for him bleed for him.

There’s no hiding from the truth. 

Not when it’s right there, in Clarke Griffin’s eyes, in her face, in her fury.

He has no idea what happens next, but he sees Clarke reach for Murphy, and Echo's fist connects with his face, a tooth dislodged and blood pouring into his mouth.

“Still, this is not about you. It’s about your sister.”

Bellamy spits out the blood from his mouth, looks up at Echo. “What about my sister?”

“Her little kingdom is expanding. We wouldn’t want that to interfere with our interests, would we? Besides, you owe me.”

And there it is. The debts, signed in blood. There it is. Hundreds and thousands dying for a portion of the land.

When he was younger, Bellamy was braver. Now, he’s just so damn tired. 

He looks at Clarke, hoping to see some understanding in her eyes, but there’s nothing but a cold sheet - metal as cool as the hilt of the dagger he’d found buried in the sand.

At his lowest point, when he'd felt more sunken than alive, barely making it through the motions, she came in with her ramrod straight spine and a petulantly raised chin. She came and she said:

_ "I am looking for work." _

With time, he realized how tired she'd been. You don't escape a kingdom ready to embrace you if the water hasn't reached your throat.

You don't let ropes cut into your palms so deeply that they leave scars if that’s not better than the horrors waiting for you at home.

_ "The journey will be long and the pay not nearly enough," _ he warned her, and she took it with all the grace of an exile.

Looking back, only to find her home burning.

He wasn’t surprised by her true identity. No, what surprised him were her steadfast hands - the day she got the ‘Hold fast’ tattoo, her delirious fury when she sprawled herself across his table because he wouldn’t listen to her.

Her love, when she decided to tighten her hand around the neck of a woman who accused him of being a murderer.

Being loved by her was different. Colder. Steadier. He doesn't think he lived until the moment he witnessed Clarke Griffin diving into the barely unthawed waters as though she needed it to breathe.

He had never seen anyone so thirsty for the sea. 

Not since the last time he swallowed a mouthful.

Now, Echo is talking next to him, but all he can see is _ her_. There’s a glint in her sleeve.

They both nod at the same time.

“Now! Miller!”

All hell breaks loose when Clarke stands up, a knife in her hands, making a quick work of her own and Murphy’s binds. Miller and Emori barge in through the door, knives and pistols and fury.

Bellamy feels a punch to his gut, doesn’t know where it comes from. It’s hard to know - all you can really do in a battle is try and come out on top. 

All he hears are battle cries, clashing knuckles and the tell-tale smell of gunpowder and lead.

Raven strides in last, a single wire in her hand. 

“Stop, or we all go up in flames.”

_ Smart woman. _

With Echo gone, Clarke is next to Bellamy. She looks worse than him, and yet it’s her helping him up.

“Clarke, I’m - “

The look in her eyes leaves no room for explanation. She silently helps him get up, and then she’s gone, standing side by side with Echo, putting the same chains that used to be on Bellamy on the Azgeda warrior.

“Bellamy,” Echo starts, threatening, but Clarke motions for her to stop.

“He can’t help you. I’m the only one who can. So if you’d like to stay alive, I suggest you start talking.”

He watches the two of them, side by side. Clarke above, Echo below. Clarke’s face caked with mud and blood, Echo’s caked with white paint. One golden, another dark.

_ You could have kept her safe, _ Raven told him, right after calling him a coward. _ They’re all afraid of you. _

But no one is really afraid of ghosts, are they?

And that’s all he is.

“Like hell I will,” Echo shoots back, spitting on Clarke’s boots and ferociously looking up. “You’re no one.”

_ Isn’t she as worthy of fighting for as Hakeldama once was? _

He looks back on his life, his motley crew. Emori’s arms around Murphy’s waist, helping him stay standing. Miller and Raven keeping an eye on warriors and mercenaries.

Clarke turns her back on Echo for just a second, and it’s enough for her to move, to reach for her leg in the sand, but Bellamy’s quicker this time around.

He stops her with a hand around her wrist.

“No. She’s the captain. Answer her.”

He doesn’t look at Clarke, doesn’t know what to tell her. All he knows is that this woman, who hasn’t been with them for that long anyway, deserves this family more than he ever could.

And for that, he’ll have to work. For that, he’ll have to make amends.

Clarke’s voice is like ice.

“Who sent you?”

*

What follows are hours of talking. Xandria’s interests intertwined with Azgeda’s. Echo’s interests intertwined with her kingdom’s. 

They all listen until the torches are blown out, and dawn breaks through the window in the ceiling, the mud and the dirt and the blood suddenly illuminated like counting all the kills. 

Finally, Echo stops talking, and Clarke sits in silence.

“I’m sorry,” she finally says, after a long pause. She sits in front of Echo and she says, “I’m sorry.”

Bellamy feels an invisible stone pressing the breath out of his chest.

“I want to talk with your queen, as the crown princess of Arkadia. As the captain of Red Queen Octavia.”

She inhales sharply, pressing a hand to her right side, and frowns at Echo. “And if I untie you, can I trust you _ not _to attack me?”

Echo nods, solemn.

Bellamy doesn’t understand a thing, but maybe he doesn’t have to. Clarke helps Echo to her feet, just as she’d helped him, and directs her towards one of the rare few chairs in the room. There’s a well at the center of it, he finally sees.

It’s where the maps once used to be. Where he signed the treaty in Octavia’s place.

Where his sister finally took the kingdom that was her birthright, after years of hiding in Arkadia, just waiting on the moment to take back what was rightfully theirs.

These days, she doesn’t know what to do with it, just as he doesn’t know what to do with a ship he marched into a war on. 

But Clarke does.

“Do you need water?” Clarke asks Echo, and then gives her some. She presses a gauze to her swollen lip, just as she’d done with Miller. “We’ll be in Xandria in two weeks. I’ll stay there for a month. Can I expect you to come with Queen Nia?”

“Yes, but - “

Clarke nods, smiles. “Good.”

Bellamy’s throat is sore, and his voice comes out as a gruff crackle. “Octavia won’t trust you. She doesn’t know you.”

It’s the last time Clarke looks at him.

Her gaze is cold, and it’s unyielding. The captain of the ship. The queen. 

Wanheda.

“But I know her.”

*

During the next two weeks, Clarke doesn’t say a single word to him.

He stays in his chambers, and she commands from the deck and her old room. 

Shame burns through Bellamy when he remembers that he’d given her that moldy cabin just to break her down. Just to get her to confess that she’s not up to being on the Octavia.

And look at her now.

Now, it’s her they all look to. 

Murphy prepares a feast as soon as he’s able, and Emori spends hours with Clarke on deck.

She cleans the deck, the same as Jasper.

She steers the ship and checks on the engine, the same as Raven.

And when the time comes for Bellamy to dine in the mess hall, she gets up and leaves without ceremony. 

When they reach Xandria, it’s Clarke who steps off the ship first, Bellamy trailing behind her. Octavia raises an eyebrow, but doesn’t question.

“My queen,” Clarke nods, and Octavia’s features break out from a schooled neutrality into a wide grin.

“If I’m your queen, does that make _ you _my queen?”

They get along like a house on fire.

Soon enough, Bellamy is not needed.

They handle the negotiations themselves. He sees Octavia’s jaw tighten when Queen Nia and Echo approach, their boat docked and guarded by three dozens of Octavia’s men, but at the end of the day, they agree on terms.

Another treaty is signed - this time, without him.

“They left an hour ago,” Murphy tells him after bringing a plate to his room in what used to be the palace. He wolfs down food, and Bellamy can’t open his mouth. “Clarke and Octavia look happy. They got the entire western territory in exchange for the north, which - just as well. No one here likes the cold.”

Xandria has changed, and Murphy is right. Looking at the people in the streets now, no one could tell that there was a war not a decade ago.

Children laugh in the morning. Couples stroll down the streets with flowers and drinks in their hands. Bellamy can hear them deep into the night, the sighs, the giggles, the warm, careless whispers of a nation at peace.

When Clarke finally visits him, it’s too late.

She’s changed in the time she’s been here. Her skin is darker - courtesy of the sun. Her shoulders are lighter - the courtesy of the palace being transformed into a main square of sorts; the stone walls surrounding it a promise that they will always be safe.

And with a woman like Clarke in charge of the famed Red Queen Octavia, Bellamy thinks that the bargain will be held up.

He’s about to head to bed when he’s interrupted by a knock at the door, and he opens it immediately, hoping - as he always does - that it’s her.

This time, it is. But unlike her normal disposition, this Clarke - the Clarke she becomes for him - is colder, sharper. She crosses her arms at her chest and starts talking.

“I’m just here to - “

“Please,” he interjects, moves aside. “At least come in.”

For a second, she mulls it over, frowning, and then nods. His room is smaller than his cabin on the ship was. He’ll tell Octavia he’s leaving in a week, get a room of his own downtown in Beda until they set sail again. Start over.

Do better.

“Like I was saying, I’m here to tell you that we’re leaving tomorrow.”

It hits him like a punch to the chest, and Bellamy has to hold on to his desk just to stay on his feet.

“Leaving? But we just - “

“We don’t want you with us. _ I _don’t want you with us.”

The silence falls down on the room like a gravestone. Outside, the people are still laughing in the soft night. Xandria is alive and blooming.

It’s just Bellamy who feels like this is the end.

“I understand,” he finally says, accepting it. Clarke’s eyes widen imperceptibly, but he doesn’t comment on it. He’s lost the right to. “I wish you a safe journey. May we - “

She raises her hand, shakes her head with a rueful smile. “Don’t. We _ will _meet again. But I want you to know that we will not be lovers. We will not be friends. And we will not be partners.”

Her eyes are burning a hole in his head, and all Bellamy can do is sit and wait for the judgement. 

“I showed you where my loyalties lie plenty of times. You haven’t shown me anything. You were willing to leave Murphy behind. And Echo…” she shakes her head, incredulous. “You betrayed your sister, although I’m sure you don’t see it that way.”

“I do - “ he tries, but she’s not listening. She’s stopped listening a long time ago, he realizes, and he’s to blame.

“I thought I could love you, Bellamy,” she says at last, her voice cracking, her eyes suddenly filling with tears. He sees her now - the woman who laughed at him when she told him she loved him, as simple as the fact that the sun always rises. An absolute truth. 

“But I don’t know how to love someone who is always leaving their family behind.”

The Octavia sails out at dawn. Bellamy is there to watch them leave, side by side with Octavia, wishing them all good luck there is in the world.

Clarke just looks at him for the longest time, and says nothing.

*

For the next two years, he watches his crew sail in and out of his life. 

Clarke is now handling the majority of Octavia’s missions, sailing out at dawn with tired eyes, and sailing into the port at dusk, the furious orange glow of the sun making her look like she’s set ablaze.

The crew leave with worries, and come back with joy.

There are still diamonds swimming in the rum barrels. Manuscripts hiding in the gunpowder. Bellamy should know; he inspects them all. 

But there’s also always something for the people of Xandria. A sword or two for Octavia, a book for Bellamy, exotic candy from across the world for the kids in Octavia and Bellamy’s care, kids whose parents died so they could be at peace.

“She’s doing a good job,” he tells Octavia one afternoon. 

Since he was no longer the captain of her most important ship, he’s become an advisor to her. Mostly, he helps her keep their people happy, and do whatever it takes for them to stay that way.

If it means sitting across the table from Echo and Queen Nia, so be it.

If it means rolling up his sleeves and building cabins in their new western territory, that’s fine by Bellamy.

It’s all good, as long as he knows he’s done something right by the end of the day.

For the longest time, Bellamy only recognized two emotions: careful fear and dead devotion.

Mostly, he’d felt careful fear. Walking on eggshells, afraid of ruining what little they had left. And careful fear had taken him far. It saved his life more than once. Plenty of times, when he dropped it, and exchanged it for dead devotion, he’d been burnt. His people decimated. His army falling to shambles. 

His sister falling to her knees.

He’d only felt that dead devotion three times in his life:

The first time, when he realized Octavia would become the queen of Xandria, no matter what. He’d have gladly crawled to hell and back to do that for her. 

The second time, it was when Clarke was taken by Echo. 

He took his careful fear and inspected it under the light. What else was there to be afraid of? He had to keep his people safe. He had to keep the woman he loved safe. Clarke Griffin wasn’t just worthy of a bloodshed akin to Hakeldama. 

She was worth dying for, and coming back to life again.

So that’s what he did.

When he set foot in Xandria again, all he saw was Clarke showing him (and everyone else) what they could do to become better people.

The third dead devotion he'd felt was a choice, one he made day in and day out.

Like she is reading his mind, Octavia smiles next to him, a glass of wine pressed to her lips. She’s older, wiser, but still has the same fire in her eyes.

“I know. It’s why I’ve made her the captain of my ship.”

“_Your _ ship?” Bellamy asks, feeling his mouth pulling up in a smile. Octavia just shrugs, pretending like they’re twelve again, without a care in the world.

“Well, that is _ my _figure on the bow.”

Bellamy doesn’t remember the last time he’s laughed as much, but it feels good. It warms him down to his core, until he wraps an arm around Octavia’s shoulders, and she pretends to be annoyed but presses closer to him.

It’s been almost a year since they’d seen Clarke and the crew last. They all miss the warmth.

“What about you?” Octavia asks, looking up at him. Bellamy brushes a stray curl off her forehead, traces the scar on her brow.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean…” she moves away a bit, takes another sip of her wine, “is this all there is for you? Working for me? Don’t you miss the blue?”

He wakes up seasick with longing.

He sits on the pier just to feel the salt again.

And every time he looks out his window in Beda, he can’t see the sea, and something monstrous tears into him.

“I do, but I’m happy here.”

At the same time, he has a small, cold room, devoid of artefacts of his old life. 

There’s nothing but a bed, a dresser, a desk, and a window. In the summer, oven-hot air streams in, and he lies on the floor for hours, just breathing.

In the winter, he can hear the footfalls in the sand. The laughing. Kids joyfully pour out into the street with parents calling for them to at least wear sweaters, if they won’t wear coats and scarves.

He’s found a kind of peace on the other side. No one misses him, and he’s learned how to be good like this. How to do good work here. 

It’s all there needs to be. 

But Octavia looks at him with her knowing eyes, and Bellamy sinks into his chair. Smiles at her.

“You were never a good liar, big brother.”

“What do you want me to say? Even if I wanted to, she’d never have me again.”

Octavia’s lips quirk up in a smile. “She’s coming back in a month. Maybe you could ask her for work, just as she’d asked you.”

The memory of his behavior then burns, but he can't escape the perfect symmetry of it. 

They sit in silence until the clock tower chimes midnight, and then Octavia wishes him a good night, presses a kiss to the top of his head. He feels very young suddenly, a feeling like growing roots in his chest.

“There’ll always be people who build cabins. But Bellamy, not many can build a future.”

*

His idea of building a future is building cabins in the West, and making sure that the new settlements are ready to live in.

At least, that's what he tells Lincoln.

"I call bullshit," his sister's husband tells him, taking a swing at his face. Bellamy narrowly dodges it in the very last minute.

Lincoln grins when Bellamy huffs.

"You're not in shape. The sea life get you lazy?" he taunts, turning his grin into a growl when Bellamy manages to graze his jaw. "I don't remember you being this slow."

"Fuck off, Lincoln."

The taller man lands a blow to Bellamy's chest, and this time, Bellamy manages to fight back the urge to just let himself be and collapse on the floor.

He stays standing.

"Low blow, man," he says, but there's a smile pulling his mouth upwards, and he swings for Lincoln with his right fist. When he gets distracted blocking him, Bellamy lands a punch to Lincoln's side with his left.

"Nice!"

That only spurs Bellamy on, and so he keeps going, raining controlled punches to Lincoln's stomach. By the time they're both sweaty, they've both got as good as they gave.

"Remind me why we're doing this," Lincoln says, grabbing a bottle of water. It's scorching hot already, the morning promises a hellish day.

It's a good question. Why _ are _they doing this, sparring in the heat just before Bellamy is set to go back to the West?

The simple answer would be that yes, being the captain of the Octavia _ has _made him soft. He doesn't want to give anyone the upper hand to chain him anymore.

And he hates the fact that Clarke had to come to his rescue.

"I just want to stay fit," he says, shrugging nonchalantly as Lincoln rolls his eyes. "Fine. It's because of the Dead Zone."

The air in the room changes and Lincoln stands up straighter immediately.

"You should stop punishing yourself for that, Blake. Octavia saved my ass a few times, too. Doesn't make you any less of a man."

The interesting thing is how half of Xandria seems to know what happened. That same half is pretty sure that Clarke will sail back home to him, too.

Unlike his people, Bellamy knows better than to expect that. They see Clarke as a kind, golden-haired captain.

He's seen her steel.

"It's not- I'm not afraid for my masculinity," Bellamy defends, curling his mouth in distaste at the word. 

"What is it, then?"

"I couldn't protect her."

Lincoln sighs and takes a seat by the sparring ring, smoothly passing through the ropes and patting the bench right next to him.

When he first met the man, Bellamy thought he was too soft-spoken for a warrior. Not enough for Octavia.

Then, they fought side by side, and he realized that being a warrior isn't just knowing how to wield a sword. You had to know how to wield your mind and your words, as well.

So now, it's Lincoln he chooses for sparring, and drinks, whenever they're both in Beda. The older Bellamy gets, the more he looks up to his sister's husband.

"If I heard right, what Clarke was really furious about was the fact that you didn't go after Murphy," Lincoln tells him, leaning forward with his hands clasped between his knees. "Not the fact you didn't fight well."

"I screwed up, I know."

Lincoln nods honestly. "Yes, you did. I haven't had the pleasure of talking to Clarke much, but I get the impression that she is a proud, loyal woman. The kind of woman who doesn't leave her family behind."

And Bellamy knows this. He does. What he should've done was find Murphy, stand up to Echo and her men.

Instead, he turned into a coward, figuring five alive and one dead was better than six dead, a careful-fear equation based on skewed factors.

"I wouldn't make the same mistake. I'm not going to make the same mistake."

Lincoln nods.

"So find a way to prove that you've changed."

And he does.

*

The Western frontier is constantly whipped by deliriously hot gusts of wind this time of the year. 

The morning sun starts scorching, and it's not until midnight that the dirt and the stone cool down, giving everyone a chance to exhale.

Bellamy sits on a porch of a nearly finished cabin, sweating and panting as he looks on at the settlement. Just the other day, he'd helped Monty and Harper Green place a post office sign on their little house.

The caravans rise dirt in their wake, but at least there's already kids playing with tumbleweeds.

"Your peach iced tea, Captain."

A voice breaks him out of the revelry, and Bellamy stirs, only to find Gina smiling down at him with a tall glass.

"Come on, Gina," he starts, taking the proffered glass and immediately taking a sip. It cools him down, and he smiles gratefully. "You know it's Bellamy."

She shrugs, wiping her hands on her apron and sliding down to take a seat on the step next to him. "I don't know. I _ know _ you were a captain, back in the day."

It feels a long time ago when he's here. The work and the heat make him forget the past - all he thinks about is the work ahead.

A few more months, and it'll all be done.

He's terrified of not knowing what he'll do next.

"I think my roof has a leak."

Thankfully, there'll always be holes in roofs and delayed caravans he can ride out to.

"A leak, you say?" he asks, grinning at Gina. She smiles sweetly at him. "Didn't know it rained recently."

"Mhm," she hums. "I think you should take a look at it."

Gina is a good woman, and she kisses as softly as she speaks. They're both orphans, but unlike Bellamy, she spent her whole life in Xandria. She has friends that have turned into family here, all riding out to turn this wilderness into a home.

She doesn't ask for much, just lies quietly by him on the creaky bed he'd assembled.

"I met someone," she whispers, as the afternoon cascades into dusk. Outside, his horse neighs. "His name is Jack. He's the sheriff's deputy."

Bellamy hums into the salty skin of her shoulder, places a light kiss there.

"Mm, does he have a shiny badge?"

Gina laughs, dislodging herself from him. "He does, actually. Appointed by Queen Octavia."

"She snores in her sleep," Bellamy supplies unhelpfully, and Gina rolls her eyes at him.

"He wants to stay here, Bellamy."

And there it is. For all their whispered sweetness, Gina's new man wants to stay in the West. Everyone knows that Bellamy might not stay, even if he swore so six times from Sunday. 

There's something missing.

So he smiles at Gina, untangling himself from her sheets and getting dressed slowly.

"Then I wish you both a lot of luck. Hopefully, you'll let me send you a wedding present."

She pecks his cheek.

"Thank you for my home."

Bellamy squeezes her hand, settling his hat on the top of his head. "It was my pleasure."

*

The next morning, he's called off from the construction of a young family's home. They send a boy to fetch him, and he comes rushing, raising so much dirt that Bellamy starts coughing.

"The Queen's caravan is stuck by the Pine Ridge!" he announces excitedly, and Bellamy chuckles, dropping a few pennies in his palm.

"Thank you for telling me. We wouldn't want to keep the Queen's men and women waiting, would we?"

"No, sir!"

With that, the boy sets off again, and Bellamy mounts his horse. The longer he's here, the less he minds the heat. It slows him down, but the warm wind whips against his cheeks and he knows that he's doing good here.

It's quite a way to the Pine Ridge, so he digs his heels into his stallion's sides, and they blaze through the emptiness.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading! :) I'd love to hear what you thought - kudos & comments are waaay better than rum!
> 
> Also, that opening sentence comes from a quote - "Lord, you gave me a rare woman, and God! I loved her well!" I found it on the Mummy gifset on Tumblr, but I've been told it comes from Dragonfly in Amber by Diana Gabaldon.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading!
> 
> The line about Clarke needing to be cold and hungry and weary comes from H. D. Thoreau: _"Take long walks in stormy weather or through deep snows in the fields and woods, if you would keep your spirits up. Deal with brute nature. Be cold and hungry and weary."_
> 
> **I'd love to hear your thoughts about this fic! If you liked it, I'd really appreciate it if you [reblogged the photoset on my Tumblr.](https://marauders-groupie.tumblr.com/post/186934147332)**
> 
> Be sure to check out the incredible [@underbellamy's edit dedicated to this fic](https://underbellamy.tumblr.com/post/187734305263/bellarke-fanfiction-dedication-atlas-hands-ff-by), pirate-style! 
> 
> Thank you! <3


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